Spotlight: Snitch City

Reporters Dugan Arnett and Andrew Ryan are back in court to learn the fate of a case that has spanned eight years. In 2017, New Bedford police accused Steven Ortiz of being at the center of a major drug trafficking ring. But an officer involved in his arrest was sleeping with Ortiz’s fiancee while using her as an unwitting confidential informant. This case was what first brought Arnett to New Bedford. In the two years since he broke the story, one drug trafficking case has already been tossed. Now, an even bigger case hangs in the balance. And the outcome could bring a reckoning for police and prosecutors.

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Two former New Bedford informants tell shocking stories. The first: a woman who didn’t even know she was being used as an informant by the cop she was sleeping with. The second: a man who was Paul Oliveira’s informant decades ago and who knows – better than anyone – how the police chief exploits the secrecy of this world. Spotlight reporters Dugan Arnett and Andrew Ryan try to get answers and accountability.

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When Frank "Rizzo" Simmons was a big-time drug dealer in New Bedford in the '90s, he went toe-to-toe with a drug cop named Paul Oliveira. After a major bust of Frank’s headquarters, Oliveira tries to turn Frank into an informant. But snitching goes against everything Frank believes in. This won’t be the last time Frank will have to decide if he should cooperate. But the next time, it’s going to be harder to stay true to his code. Because next time, he'll be asked to snitch on Paul Oliveira.

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Meet New Bedford’s police chief, Paul Oliveira. He’s had a hand in both of the stories we’ve already heard. And the Spotlight Team's reporting shows there's a dark backstory behind Oliveira's rise to the top of the department. Oliveira wrote the playbook on using informants. In this episode, a former New Bedford narcotics cop who worked alongside the chief for nearly two decades agrees to go on the record about everything he’s seen… and taken part in.

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Spotlight reporter Dugan Arnett receives a desperate phone call from an informant who’s now in prison. He says he's afraid for his life because other inmates know he cooperated with police. This informant always knew he’d be in danger if someone from his gang found out that he was a snitch. What he didn’t anticipate was being betrayed by police, including a New Bedford officer who shares information with a member of the informant's gang.

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On the docks of New Bedford, Massachusetts, whispers about a rogue police officer harassing fishermen and stealing drugs come to a head aboard a scalloping boat late one night. The officer forces his way on board, saying an informant told him there would be drugs on board, and demands some. But when another officer, Mark Raposo, shows up, he thinks his colleague is in the middle of a “drug rip.” Now Raposo is ready to blow the whistle on what he’s seen. And it turns out that this officer’s abuse of the informant system is just the tip of the iceberg in this historic port city. 

*Note: this episode was updated Mar 12, 2025, to include a statement from police that the Globe received after the deadline.

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In a nation addicted to drugs, police across the country have become addicted to informants. Nowhere is this more apparent than in one New England port city, where police have been empowered to use informants to take down dealers by almost any means necessary. This is the story of a deeply flawed system, the flawed individuals working within it, and the injustices that can occur when no one’s watching.

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In just a few weeks, the Boston Globe’s new podcast will drop. Informants are the nameless, faceless cogs of the criminal justice system. And their use is cloaked in near total secrecy. Reporter Dugan Arnett will show how police misconduct and informant abuse have run rampant.

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Confidential informants are the backbone of America’s war on drugs. But the way police use them has remained almost entirely hidden. Until now. 

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