An NYPD housing officer who helped her boyfriend run a heroin trafficking ring was caught with $25,000 in drug money, stuffed in a purse with her service weapon, federal authorities said.
Yessenia Jimenez, 31, and her boyfriend, Luis Soto, 33, were busted Tuesday on drug-trafficking and weapon possession charges, as part of a larger investigation into heroin trafficking from Mexico into New York.
The two turned their Bronx apartment into a drug stash house, federal prosecutors said, and Jimenez traveled to Massachusetts with Soto for an “important stop” with a heroin trafficker, prosecutors said.
The couple popped up on the Drug Enforcement Administration’s radar in January, after finding Soto’s phone number on the cell phone of a narcotics trafficking suspect from Queens.
Soto made the trip to Massachusetts on Sunday, and headed back to New York at about 10:30 p.m., authorities said.
At 2 a.m. on Tuesday, a joint DEA, NYPD and state police task force stopped Soto’s car outside their Boynton Ave. apartment in Soundview, after he started unloading bags from his trunk.
Jimenez was sitting in the passenger seat, the stuffed purse at her feet, with the handle of her NYPD-issued Glock 9-mm gun sticking out.
Soto was carrying another $25,000 in a black plastic grocery bag, and he admitted he picked up all the cash from Massachusetts, according to court filings.
A search of their apartment uncovered about 250 grams of alleged heroin in a closet, prosecutors said.
Jimenez joined the NYPD in 2015. She’s been suspended without pay, a police spokesman said.
Her Facebook page shows her wearing NYPD t-shirts and hats, and sharing several pro-police messages.
Jimenez’s lawyer, Mark Gombiner, challenged the weapon-possession charged filed against her.
“This is her service weapon,” Gombiner said. “Given that she’s a police officer she’s kind of mandated (to have) her service weapon with her.”
A judge ordered her held on $75,000 bond, while Soto agreed to be held without bail.