2018 NJSPBA Valor Awards
Meritorious Service Award
Offi cer Matthew Kocen
Offi cer Kyheem Davis
Offi cer Eliot Perez
Neptune Township Local 74
Ready…set…catch…
the man with the gun
Football teams should execute with
the impeccable precision and timing
that Neptune Township Officers Matt
Kocen, Kyheem Davis and Eliot Perez ex-
hibited on July 24, 2017. Their game plan
in capturing a fleeing man with a gun
was that exact, and the audibles called
to eventually contain him would have
made Peyton Manning proud.
“We’re so tight here that we don’t have
to talk much. Everyone knows what to
do,” declared Perez who, with two years
on, was able to follow the lead of 18-year
veteran Davis and 15-year veteran Kocen
to come out safely when the subject was
pointing a gun at him.
“We were very tight, all of us,” Kocen
confirmed. “I think just from the nature
of where we work, we’ve been with each
other for many, many years.”
A call came in of a burglary in progress
and a man with a gun in a local Wawa.
When Kocen arrived, he learned that the
man was in the bathroom. So he quickly
cleared out the store to make sure that all
citizens were moved to safety.
Now, this was a bit of a clever bandit.
When in the restroom, he apparently
took off his sweatshirt and was able to fil-
ter out with the crowd. But that freedom
only lasted a few seconds.
A Neptune Special Officer saw the
man running away. He reported the in-
formation, and Davis, Kocen and Perez,
who responded in separate units, were
able to set up a perimeter of contain-
ment – Cover 3, if you will.
“I kind of knew intuitively where
he was cutting through to. Officer Da-
vis came around, Officer Perez came
around, and I came around,” Kocen ex-
plained. “He had his gun drawn when I
58
NEW JERSEY COPS
■ DECEMBER 2018
got there. I saw him running, and he ac-
tually pointed the gun at Officer Perez.
As I pulled up, I was behind another car
and I saw him kind of duck behind the
car. He was coming down the other way.
I was either going to tackle him or shoot
him.”
Such action was not needed because
the three officers had the man surround-
ed.
“It’s normally what you do when you
get a subject like this and you’re actually
looking for a person,” noted Davis, evok-
ing the by-the-book procedure practiced
repeatedly during training that made
the difference on this day. “We set up a
perimeter figuring he can only go but
so far. So once you set up a perimeter,
it’s kind of easy to work your way in. We
knew that he only had certain ways that
he could go.”
As a result, the man wound up face-to-
face with Perez, who pointed his weapon
right back.
“We’re pretty much at a standstill,” Pe-
rez recalled. “Once he realizes I’m proba-
bly going to shoot him, he runs away and
he goes behind a car. I saw these two of-
ficers, and it was like seeing God because
I knew I had backup.”
Seeing Davis and Kocen startled
the man enough that he tripped. They
moved to him quickly and wrestled his
gun away. The play ended there, and for
a man with a gun fleeing it was game
over.