Cops

AN INTERNAL AFFAIRS investigation into extortion allegations has led Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey to strip two cops of their police powers. One of the officers, identified by law-enforcement sources as Jonathan Lazarde, allegedly tried to shake down a man whom he had recently arrested on a gun charge. The arrangement was simple: If the man paid off Lazarde, the six-year veteran of the force allegedly said he wouldn't show up for court, meaning the charges would eventually be dropped, the sources said.

POLICE SHOT a 31-year-old man who allegedly fired at an officer late Thursday night in West Philadelphia. Police said the officer, whom they did not name, was investigating a robbery of a 7-Eleven near 58th and Whitby just before midnight. He spotted a man who fit the description of one of the thieves near the corner of 58th and Baltimore. When the officer approached and attempted to pat him down, the man pulled away from the officer and pulled out a handgun, firing twice, police said.

IT'S NOT unusual for people to try to weasel their way out of cab fare, offering a sob story or sweet smile in hopes a charitable driver will go away uncompensated. Michael Medvec was short on cash Friday night when it came time to pay his $8 fare on Chestnut Street near 2nd. But instead of a story or a smile, the 23-year-old Old City man allegedly made an unusual offer of payment. He handed the hack a baggie of marijuana. Right in front of two police officers. He was quickly arrested and charged with possession, a misdemeanor.

Warsaw in 1937 was a city full of intrigue. A city crawling with spies. A city on the brink of war. Its story is told in BBC America's superb, gorgeously shot mini-series Spies of Warsaw , which premieres Wednesday. It's one of two major new TV dramas this week, along with Rogue , a gritty, violent cop series from DirectTV's Audience Network, which also begins Wednesday, with a feature-length pilot. Spies of Warsaw is a lush, classic spy yarn starring David Tennant ( Doctor Who , Hamlet )

LOS ANGELES - Belen Fernandez didn't want to go on a weeklong trip to Denver with her husband and his two brothers to visit her ailing father-in-law, but her children eventually persuaded her to go. It was the last thing she would do for her family. The 53-year-old mother of six died Saturday along with her husband, Raudel Fernandez-Avila, 49, his two brothers and a stepniece in a crash north of Las Vegas that authorities said Monday was caused by a drunken driver. Authorities said the family van was rear-ended about 3 a.m. Saturday by an SUV driven by 18-year-old Jean Ervine Soriano, who was being held Monday on $3.5 million bail on felony drunken-driving charges.

A woman was arrested Friday afternoon after police said she hit a police officer with a vase in the city's Harrowgate section. About 2:35 p.m., officers were investigating a 21-year-old man when he began fighting with them in the 3400 block of H Street, police said. A woman, whose age was not available, emerged from a residence and struck an officer with the vase, police said. Both people were arrested and charged with assaulting police. The officers suffered minor injuries.    - Robert Moran

A former North Jersey police officer was sentenced Wednesday in Bucks County for a day of mayhem in and around his ex-wife's Doylestown home last Father's Day. Richard Klementovich, 42, was sentenced to 81/2 to 20 years in prison for the exchange of gunfire with police and a 10-hour standoff, the website PhillyBurbs.com reported. - Philly.com  

A 38-year-old Gloucester Township, Camden County, man is charged with using his Blackwood residence as a base to make a psychedelic drug derived from plants. Robert Vickers, of the 1500 block of Little Gloucester Road, was charged with various drug offenses for manufacturing Dimethyltryptamine, known as the hallucinogenic drug DMT, in the residence. The arrest was the result of a month-long investigation by the Gloucester Township Police and federal Drug Enforcement Administration.

A PASSENGER who apparently didn't want to settle for coach on his flight from Philadelphia to Florida on Wednesday night posed as a pilot so he could sit in the cockpit instead, police say. Philippe Jeannard, 60, of La Rochelle, France, had a ticket for the flight but allegedly donned what appeared to be an Air France captain's outfit and gained access to the cockpit of a US Airways flight departing Philadelphia International Airport. "When Jeannard could not produce proper credentials, he was removed from the flight and the police were notified," said Jillian Russell, a Police Department spokeswoman.

A POTTSTOWN high-school student allegedly had smoked pot and was texting when he veered across two lanes and fatally struck a jogger earlier this month, police say, and prosecutors hope to use his high to get a lengthier sentence. The Montgomery County District Attorney's Office on Thursday announced charges of DUI and vehicular homicide against Justin Jackson, 18. A news release notes that investigators found traces of marijuana in the Pottstown teen's blood shortly after the crash.