New Jersey

Justice Department finds pattern of misconduct by Trenton Police

Published

1 year ago

November 21, 2024

Justice Department finds pattern of misconduct by Trenton Police

From Camden and Cherry Hill to Trenton and the Jersey Shore, what about life in New Jersey do you want WHYY News to cover? Let us know.

The Justice Department said Trenton’s police department have made arrests without legal basis, officers have escalated situations with aggression and used pepper spray unnecessarily.

The results of the yearlong investigation were contained in a 45-page report released Thursday morning during a virtual press conference with U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Philip Sellinger and Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

“The people of Trenton deserve nothing less than fair and constitutional policing,” Sellinger said. “When police stop someone in Trenton, our investigation found that all too often they violated the constitutional rights of those they stopped, sometimes with tragic consequences.”

Maati Sekmet Ra, co-founder of the Trenton Anti-Violence Coalition, said she is not surprised about the Justice Department’s findings.

“You cannot talk about violence that happens and occurs in a place like Trenton without talking about police violence,” she said. “Police have historically brutalized, harassed and now it’s proven that they’re violating the civil rights of folks who live in Trenton.”

Officers violate the 4th Amendment in 2 areas

The two main findings of the report are that Trenton officers use excessive force and conduct warrantless traffic stops, searches and arrests. Both violate the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

According to the report, officers reported using force in 815 incidents between March 2020 and December 2023. The majority of them involved physical force; pepper spray was used by officers 120 times. A firearm was used once.

In one incident mentioned during the press conference, a 64-year-old man died from respiratory failure after he was sprayed in the face with pepper spray. Officers went to the man’s house to arrest his son who was involved in an earlier domestic incident.

The man, who was not involved in the incident, met with officers outside his front door informing them they would not be allowed in his house without a warrant. As they waited for a supervisor to come to the scene, one of the officers escalated the conversation, taunting the father and son, according to the federal report.

The officer said the son was “talking like he was ‘retarded’ and asking if the father was ‘crazy,’” according to the report. The language the officer used according to the report is considered outdated and a slur toward people with mental disabilities.

As the father was about to re-enter his house, an officer threw him across the porch, against the railing and slammed him face down on the porch steps. As officers were arresting the father, another officer sprayed him in the face.

“The officer who escalated the encounter inaccurately reported that the father physically presented a ‘threat/attack’ to the officer,” the report stated. “He also claimed that he grabbed the father because he feared that a dog inside would come out—a factor that no other officer mentioned and that video footage discredited.”

The father died 18 days after the incident.

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New Jersey

White Christmas in the Philadelphia region this year? Cecily Tynan breaks down our chances

Published

5 hours ago

December 19, 2025

Press Room

White Christmas in the Philadelphia region this year? Cecily Tynan breaks down our chances

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — Is there anything more magical than waking up on Christmas morning to a fresh blanket of white outside?

Well, if you’re dreaming of a white Christmas in the Philadelphia region, keep dreaming. Our chances are really low.

By definition, a white Christmas is defined as having at least an inch of snow on the ground.

But since 1950, we’ve only had eight of those in Philadelphia, the latest in 2009, 1998 and 1995.

Statistically, the chance of a white Christmas in the Poconos is 40%. But then it really drops as you head to the south — Lehigh Valley at 90%, Trenton 12%, Philadelphia, Wilmington, and the Jersey Shore are all less than 10%.

And this year, it’s even less than that because temperatures will be at or above average from Christmas Eve through the 28th.

So Cecily’s official forecast for Christmas: it’s not white, it’s mostly cloudy, seasonable highs in the mid to upper 40s.

There’s always next year!

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New Jersey

Future Home to Paramount, 1888 Studios in Bayonne Breaks Ground | Jersey Digs

Published

17 hours ago

December 18, 2025

Press Room

Future Home to Paramount, 1888 Studios in Bayonne Breaks Ground | Jersey Digs

Construction has officially begun at 1888 Studios, which will revitalize 58 acres of land near the Bayonne Bridge. Image courtesy Choose New Jersey.

A large film production studio in New Jersey is officially underway as construction has begun to revitalize 58 acres of land near the Bayonne Bridge.

Public officials and film industry executives took part in a groundbreaking ceremony for 1888 Studios, a motion picture and television production complex that will rise at the foot of Avenue A in Bayonne. The event took place inside a tent on the studio construction site, which had been a Texaco refinery that closed in the 1980’s.

Jersey Digs was the first outlet to report on the studio plan back in 2022. Bayonne passed a rezoning plan in 2020 for the land, which overlooks Staten Island and the Kill Van Kull.

1888 Studios Bayonne 7 — The full plan for 1888 Studios. Image courtesy of Gensler.

Designed by San Francisco-based firm Gensler, 1888 Studios will consist of a mix of studio sound stage buildings complemented by attached office structures. The complex will include a post-production office and several mill buildings for stages to be constructed and stored.

The new facility will span 23 soundstages and more than one million square feet. The construction phase is expected to produce 2,300 union jobs and when the facility is complete and operational, it is expected to produce 2,000 union jobs.

1888 Studios Bayonne 8 — Rendering of the studio complex. Image courtesy of Gensler.

Arpad Busson, the President of the 1888 Studios, said during the ceremony that the production complex “will reshape the city for generations to come” and would make Bayonne “a global connector.” Film powerhouse Paramount signed a 10-year agreement back in October to be the facility’s primary tenant.

Other aspects of the plan for 1888 Studios include a lighting and grip building, a central utility plant, a utility yard, a trash and recycling area, and a facilities yard to support the studio use, along with surface parking. Four subterranean parking structures would be built on the site, providing a total of 2,127 parking spaces.

1888 Studios Bayonne 6 — 1888 Studios. Image courtesy of Gensler.

Paramount’s Global Operations executive Jose Turkienicz attended the groundbreaking and called the studio complex “a major step forward” and a source of “creative momentum.” A former New Jersey resident, Turkienicz thanked the state’s public officials for supporting tax credit programs for the film industry in the Garden State.

Outgoing Governor Phil Murphy said that New Jersey has an “innovation economy,” which includes film and digital industries. He noted that New Jersey gets back $7 for each $1 invested in the film industry and lauded the state’s Film Ready program that prepares communities for the movie and television business.

Among the celebrities at the ceremony were model and businesswoman Elle Macpherson; Emmy Award-winning actress Tammy Blanchard, a Bayonne resident; Mark Lipsky, executive producer of such Eddie Murphy films as The Nutty Professor, Beverly Hills Cop II, and Coming to America; and actor and executive Paul DeAngelo, a Bayonne resident.

1888 Studios is one of three major film production facilities under construction in New Jersey, with Lionsgate breaking ground recently on a studio in Newark and Netflix building another facility at Fort Monmouth.

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