Retired police officer Joseph Bini locked the door of his wife’s downtown Denver store and refused to let two runaway girls leave until they completed sex acts in front of him to his satisfaction, investigators allege in an arrest warrant filed in Denver County Court.
The affidavit, written by Detective John Donohoe, indicated the two juvenile girls spent a significant amount of time at the store, entering during daylight and leaving after dark.
During the encounter, both girls said they got scared and wanted to leave but that Bini refused to let them.
Bini, 39, was the focus of intense publicity nine years ago, when he provided Denver SWAT team officers the wrong address of a house where drugs were allegedly being sold. In a no-knock raid on the wrong home, resident Ismael Mena was shot and killed after he pointed a .22-caliber handgun at police.
A longtime police informant later said that he was responsible for the mistake and had provided the wrong address to Bini.
Bini eventually entered an “Alford plea” to first-degree official misconduct, a misdemeanor.
In entering the unique plea, Bini essentially contended there was no factual basis for the charge against him and the only reason he was entering it was because there was enough evidence that he could be convicted at trial.
He was sentenced to 12 months’ probation, and the city settled a lawsuit by Mena’s family for $400,000.
The latest incident, according to the arrest-warrant affidavit, occurred on May 21 in the heart of downtown Denver.
The two runaways said they were on the 16th Street Mall and wanted to meet the lady on the poster at the GNC store located at 500 16th St.
As they were looking at the poster, Bini approached and told the girls that the lady in the poster was his wife and that she worked there on Sundays.
One of the alleged victims said Bini started talking to them. He said that “what he would really like to see is two young” girls having sex together, the affidavit said. The girls said Bini — who was wearing a name tag with “Joe” on it — knew they were runaways and hungry.
At that point, according to investigators, Bini offered to pay the girls $20 if they would have sex in front of him.
They agreed to do it for the money. After he led them to a back room, he locked the front door.
As the girls engaged in sex, they claimed Bini exposed himself and began moving closer to the girls and started to touch one of them.
She knocked his hand away and told him not to do that.
By then, they said, they had gotten scared and wanted to leave.
One of the juveniles told police that Bini told them, “No, but what you got to remember is I got the key just for one more minute.”
She said the girls then continued to engage in sex for another minute and then asked to leave and for the $20.
Bini allegedly responded, “Yeah, but it’s not worth $20.”
The girls said Bini gave them some money, but the affidavit didn’t indicate just how much.
Investigators said the backroom at the GNC store matched the description given by one of the alleged victims and that the second girl identified Bini from a photographic lineup as the man who paid the girls.
Bini is currently under investigation for child enticement, a Class 4 felony, and unlawful sexual contact, also a Class 4 felony.
Last year, before he left the police force, Bini avoided charges on an accusation that he stole a 3-by-10-foot mat from the Pavilions.
Prosecutors in May 2007 said they could not prove Bini intended to steal the carpet.
Security cameras caught him moving the carpet from the Pavilions’ hallway to the entry of his then girlfriend’s store.
Between his legal troubles, Bini survived cancer and became a bodybuilder before taking medical retirement last year.
Bini is free on a $75,000 bond. His first court appearance is June 16.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
