
Paul Schaeffer (1933-) was Chief of the Philadelphia Police Department during the 1980s. He was arrested in 1984 for his part in running a methamphetamine trafficking operation with fellow corrupt policeman James McFee.
Biography[]

Schaeffer in 1984
Paul Schaeffer was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1933, and he joined the Philadelphia Police Department and became its chief by the 1980s. In 1980, he and narcotics detective James McFee conspired to confiscate 550 gallons of expensive chemicals (used to make amphetamines) in a drug raid, only to sell them to drug dealers for $22 million and keep the seizure off the department's records. In 1984, after McFee murdered an undercover policeman during an attempted sting operation at 30th Street Station, Captain John Book, with the help of a witness, the young Amish boy Samuel Lapp, identified McFee as the murderer and came to Schaeffer with the identification, unaware that Schaeffer had been conspiring with McFee the entire time. Schaeffer told Book that he would work to get someone from the FBI or the Treasury Department to handle the case, asked Book to make sure that nobody else knew about the case, and also discovered that Samuel Lapp and his mother Rachel Lapp were staying at John's sister Elaine's house. Schaeffer then tipped off McFee about Book's discovery, and McFee nearly killed Book in a shooting in the parking garage. However, Book had his partner Elton Carter remove the files on the Lapps as he drove the Lapps back to Lancaster, where he passed out from his wounds, and convalesced among the Amish community. Schaeffer, McFee, and fellow corrupt policeman Leon Ferguson murdered Carter after discovering his role in the Lapp case, and they then tracked down Book to Lancaster, where they intended to kill him and the Lapps to cover up the case. However, Book succeeded in drowning Ferguson in corn in a silo before shooting McFee dead with Ferguson's shotgun, and, while Schaeffer threatened to kill Rachel and her father-in-law Eli Lapp unless Book let him get away, the Amish community was alerted by Samuel's sounding of the town bell, and they confronted Schaeffer until he ultimately surrendered to Book, who promptly arrested him for his corruption, conspiracy, and attempted murder.