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Paid FBI snitch indicted by
feds
Informant accused of bilking Detroit bureau out of $200,000
faces grand jury charges
By David Shepardson / The Detroit News
DETROIT — The man accused of bilking the
Detroit FBI out of more than $200,000 by making up a multistate
drug ring was indicted by a federal grand jury Thursday.
Myron Strong, a paid confidential FBI informant since 1997,
has been in custody since January. The indictment filed by
the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section came after
attempts failed to reach a plea bargain.
In February, Strong and two other men, Robert K. Ready and
Andre Boone, were charged in a scheme to frame the head of
the Detroit FBI, Willie T. Hulon, by falsely claiming Hulon
leaked sensitive law enforcement information to their drug
ring.
Ready and Boone, who were reinterviewed by federal agents
in recent weeks, have both agreed to plead guilty and accept
plea deals, according to court records and attorneys involved
in the case.
On Thursday, the Justice Department filed an amended charge
of conspiracy to distribute drugs against Ready, and set a
plea hearing for this morning in front of U.S. District Judge
John Corbett O'Meara.
Ready was “recruited by Myron Strong ... to portray ‘Zule
Obawallah Shule,' a purported international drug dealer,”
the three-page filing said.
Pamela Szydlak, an attorney for Ready, confirmed that the
fraud charges have been dismissed, but declined to discuss
terms of the plea agreement. She said her client would plead
guilty to the single charge today.
Boone is scheduled to plead guilty Tuesday to making false
statements to a federal agency.
Strong first became an informant for local police in Michigan
in 1986 and claims to have been used as an informant in nearly
100 cases.
He was charged with defrauding the FBI, obstructing of justice,
misleading conduct, threatening to murder an FBI agent and
stealing government property.
Using scripts seized by the FBI during a search of Strong's
home, the trio falsely suggested — in phone calls they knew
were monitored by the FBI — that an unspecified employee named
“Willie” or “Hu” was leaking information to “Orande,” a character
Boone will admit to playing, the government said.
Hulon has since been promoted to a job in Washington .
You can reach David Shepardson at (313) 222-2028 or dshepardson@detnews.com.
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