Excessive force routine for police in New Jersey capital: Feds

(CN) — Police in New Jersey’s capital city of Trenton have routinely used excessive force, including pepper spray, in the absence of any danger or resistance; conducted unnecessary stops and searches; and arrested people without any legal basis, the U.S. Justice Department said Thursday.

“They are quick to escalate situations through aggressive tactics and refusal to answer people’s legitimate questions,” the department said in 45-page report, which followed a 13-month investigation.

In one incident, a man died after Trenton police officers escalated an argument, throwing him to the ground and pepper spraying him.

In another, Trenton police chased a 16-year-old boy because he matched the description of a suspect reported to have a gun. When an officer caught up to him, he grabbed the teen by his neck and slammed him into the hood of a car.

“For too long, the residents of Trenton have felt afraid of the police, rather than protected by them,” U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Philip R. Sellinger said in a statement. “The use of excessive force and unconstitutional stops, searches and arrests, sometimes with tragic consequences, have eroded public trust and undermined public safety.”

Police in Trenton, home to about 90,000 residents, regularly violated the Fourth Amendment by conducting unreasonable searches and seizures, the Justice Department said, including making stops without reasonable suspicion and, when filing reports about the incidents later, typically relying on the term “high crime area” as their justification for the search.

Justice Department officials interviewed city and police department leadership, police officers and Trenton community members. In one interview, a violent crimes detective characterized the attitude of his colleagues regarding stop and searches as amounting to: “Let’s work. Let’s pull some cars over. Let’s bring some stats in.”

The department also found that officers regularly failed to wear body cameras, despite being required to do so by state law.

Weak oversight contributed to the routine misconduct, according tot he report. Trenton police supervisors regularly sign off on force reports without meaningfully reviewing them and fail to provide any explanation or analysis as to why force was used. Multiple officers said they rarely received verbal feedback about how to minimize the use of force.

The Justice Department also found that the city has paid more than $7 million since 2021 to resolve lawsuits stemming from officer misconduct.

Trenton and its police department cooperated with the probe and adopted some reforms following the investigation, including disbanding two street enforcement units involved in the violations.

Trenton Mayor Reed Gusciora said in a statement that the city has cooperated and will continue to cooperate with the Justice Department and other organizations “to implement the recommendations highlighted in the report as quickly as possible.”

The report recommends that the police department improve its use of force policies, implement better force training, boost accountability and enhace its data collection.

The Justice Department has opened investigations of 12 other police departments under the Biden Administration, including in Minneapolis, Phoenix and Memphis, Tennessee.

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