Former Revere Police Chief Sentenced to Four Years in Prison

BOSTON (AP) _ Four men, including a former police chief and two ex- officers, were sentenced to prison today for participating in a scheme to steal, sell and alter police promotional exams.

The government’s star witness in the case, former Metropolitan District Commission Capt. Gerald W. Clemente, received a 15-year sentence despite his cooperation with prosecutors.

″You are the most amoral, arrogant and manipulative individual ever to come before the court,″ U.S. District Judge William G. Young told Clemente, who during lengthy trial testimony detailed the theft and sale of promotional exams and the altering of other test scores.

Clemente’s attorney had asked for leniency because of his client’s cooperation, but Young said he believed Clemente decided to cooperate to position himself for a lesser sentence. Clemente’s sentence will begin after he completes a 30- to 40-year sentence for his role in a Medford bank burglary.

Young sentenced former Revere Police Chief John DeLeire to four years in prison, former Somerville Capt. Frank Ray to one year and former Capitol Police Officer Richard Madden to two years.

The sentencings came a week after Young gave four other former police officers and a former legislative aide prison sentences for their convictions in the case.

Clemente, Ray and Madden were government witnesses and had pleaded guilty prior to trial. DeLeire was tried and convicted along with the defendants sentenced last week.

Young allowed DeLeire to remain free pending appeal, and released Madden and Ray until they are scheduled to report to prison. The judge also suspended all but three months of Ray’s sentence. Clemente was returned to the state prison in Concord, where he is serving the sentence for the bank burglary.

Clemente’s sentence was five years shorter than the one Young imposed last week on former Medford Police Lt. Thomas Doherty, Clemente’s partner in establishing the exam theft ring. Doherty also is serving up to 20 years in prison for the 1980 burglary at Depositor’s Trust in Medford and the shooting of former Metropolitan Police Capt. Joseph Bangs.

The other defendants sentenced last week, including Clemente’s brother, received sentences of up to four years.

According to trial testimony, Doherty and Gerald Clemente planned the exam theft and sale scheme to place allies in top police posts.

DeLeire was a Revere police lieutenant but was promoted to chief after getting the highest score on a 1979 chief’s exam. According to trial testimony, he had received a stolen copy of the test from members of the exam theft ring.

Last week, Young told the defendants they were guilty of ″corruption virtually unprecedented″ in state history.