The President’s Message
NEW JERSEY STATE
POLICEMEN’S BENEVOLENT
ASSOCIATION
EXECUTIVE BOARD
PATRICK COLLIGAN
State President
MARC KOVAR
Executive Vice-President
Peter Andreyev 1st Vice-President
Andy Haase 2nd Vice-President
Henry Werner 3rd Vice-President
Michael Pellegrino 4th Vice-President
Mark Aurigemma 5th Vice-President
Mark Messinger 6th Vice-President
Eugene Dello 7th Vice-President
Keith Bennett 8th Vice-President
Richard Kott 9th Vice-President
Bruce Chester 10th Vice-President
Margaret Hammond 11th Vice-President
Frederick Ludd, Sr. 12th Vice-President
Michael Kaniuk Financial Secretary
George Miller Recording Secretary
John Monsees Treasurer
Luke Sciallo Trustee
Frank P. Cipully Trustee
John Cernek Trustee
Ed Carattini, Jr. Trustee
Michael Freeman Trustee
Bryan Flammia Trustee
Robert Ormezzano Trustee
Joseph Biamonte Sergeant-at-Arms
Terrance Benson, Sr. Sergeant-at-Arms
Rodney Furby Sergeant-at-Arms
Charles Schwartz Sergeant-at-Arms
Patrick Moran Sergeant-at-Arms
Joseph A. Macones Sergeant-at-Arms
Sean Plasket Sergeant-at-Arms
Michael Tardio Sergeant-at-Arms
Michael Heller Sergeant-at-Arms
Keith Curry Sergeant-at-Arms
Chris Ricciotti Sergeant-at-Arms
4
NEW JERSEY COPS
■
JULY 2016
Why can’t we give Dallas officers –
and all officers – their due?
I went to bed last night to the horrific news that two Dallas law enforcement
officers were ambushed and shot. I awoke this morning to discover that 11 were
shot and five officers were killed. All due to another rush to judgement based
on just moments of viral video and a media that salivates when they see it.
Yes, I am writing to the choir, but I can’t ignore it.
Yet again, we have politicians who rush to judgement and convict these officers within hours of seeing the video of what occurred on July 7. Their names
weren’t even released, and they were tried and convicted because of some snippets of video. If I conducted an investigation and made an arrest based on what
Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman or Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton knew at the
time of their irresponsible and inflaming statements I would be arrested for malfeasance. Due
process is fair treatment through the normal judicial system. Is due process suspended when
you put on your badge
in the morning? Does
the congresswoman or
the governor want us to
change how we conduct investigations? I
sure hope not.
Patrick
Colligan
I will be sending
both of them the 105page, U.S. Department
of Justice report from
Ferguson: the “Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department.” It was authored by Vanita
Gupta. Miss Gupta needs some introduction if you aren’t familiar with her. She is the U.S. Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division who was appointed by President Obama in
2014. In her position she is the chief civil rights prosecutor for the entire country. She can certainly be considered a “card carrying” member of the ACLU because she worked there as an
attorney from 2007 until her appointment to the Justice Department in 2014. I had the opportunity to hear her speak last year and she specifically addressed her investigation and subsequent report.
Yes, she discovered significant problems within the Ferguson Police Department. Those
facts are not in dispute. But the incredible part of that report is that the “Hands up, don’t shoot”
narrative that immediately emerged from Ferguson was a farce. We endured the politicians,
the students, the protestors and even professional athletes. It was a “fact” that was perpetuated
within minutes of the shooting and it continues to this day. It served to try and convict Officer
Darren Wilson within hours of the shooting.
So, the “Hands Up” fact that emerged from Ferguson never happened. Read it for yourself
in Miss Gupta’s report. The comprehensive investigation found no evidence that it ever
occurred. If there was an electric chair in Ferguson on Aug. 9, 2014, Officer Wilson would have
been strapped in and electrocuted before the sun set that day.
My point here, yet again, is that in law enforcement we deal every day in facts and evidence.
Thankfully, we are all responsible enough to wait for those facts and evidence to emerge before
we convict anybody. I wish that someone who has ascended to a position in Congress or as a
governor of one of our 50 states could share our feelings on due process, facts and evidence.
None of those can be found within 24 hours of an incident. d