Associated Press | May 27, 2009

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Prosecutors say a police officer who served on a Southern California federal drug task force has been convicted on charges stemming from thefts of cocaine and methamphetamine from drug dealers.

U.S. attorney's spokesman Thom Mrozek said Wednesday that Huntington Park police Sgt. Alvaro Murillo of West Covina was convicted of two drug conspiracies, one count of extortion and one count of submitting a false tax return.

The 44-year-old faces a minimum sentence of 10 years in federal prison. The police force suspended him in 2006.

Murillo was accused of using his job to recruit informants in the drug world, then using them to help him steal narcotics from dealers and traffickers.

A second man in the case, Alberto Del Real-Gallardo, pleaded guilty to a drug conspiracy charge.