TULSA, Okla. (AP) — A Tulsa police officer says he placed what he thought was money from a 2009 drug bust into his pants pocket because he wanted a drug dog to sniff it out.

Officer Bruce Bonham told a federal jury Thursday that he put evidence, such as the purported drug money, in his pockets "hundreds of times" in the course of his 20 years on the police force.

Bonham is accused along with Officer Nick DeBruin and former Officer Harold Wells of planting drugs on people to obtain arrests and stealing money taken during raids and arrests. The men have pleaded not guilty.

Earlier Thursday, eight Tulsa Police Department employees testified that the three charged officers never carried around drugs to substitute as evidence to use when a suspect would swallow it or throw it away.