More troopers form the State Police and tougher prosecution of gun crimes are part of the plan. Watch video
TRENTON — The Monday after Trenton experienced four homicides in a single weekend, acting Attorney General John Hoffman had a 6:30 a.m. phone conversation with State Police Superintendent Col. Rick Fuentes.
The killings had included a double murder on East State Street that left 52-year-old Barry Church dead after he was caught in the crossfire, a 20-year-old shot in the head and a fatal stabbing.
Gun violence in the capital city had become a virtual daily occurrence. It was the death on Aug. 3 of Church, an innocent bystander sitting on a porch just a block away from his home, which struck a chord with the state’s two top law enforcement officials.
“The first thing we said to each other was, ‘That’s enough,’” Hoffman said of his conversation with Fuentes.
Together they decided to fast-track efforts already in the works to send more state troopers into Trenton to aid the city’s police force, down 140 positions following mass layoffs nearly two years ago.
New Jersey State Police tactical troopers during early-morning operations on Spring Street near Calhoun Street yesterday. “The colonel said, ‘I’m getting my people in there now,’” Hoffman said yesterday afternoon during a news conference at the Hughes Justice Complex.
Before dawn yesterday, more than 60 state troopers, sheriff’s officers and federal agents descended on Trenton for a warrant sweep that ended with 15 fugitives in handcuffs, Hoffman said.
It was the leading edge of a new, stepped-up deployment of the State Police in the capital city to combat surging violent and gun crime that has left 29 people dead and more than 150 people shot in 2013. The effort is being paired with a new directive from the attorney general’s office that makes harsher prison sentences for gun crimes mandatory, even in the cases of plea bargains.
Combined effort
While the State Police has made four deployments to Trenton since early 2012, this one will be the biggest yet, Hoffman said.
“The war zone conditions that we see in this city that break our hearts are intolerable,” Hoffman said.
The mass deployment, which led to dozens of 5 a.m. wake-up calls throughout the city by law enforcement, had no connection to the shooting of two Trenton detectives during a gunfight with a domestic violence suspect hours later. But Hoffman and the officials at the news conference said the shooting underscores Trenton’s growing violence that many residents believe has gone out of control.
The Targeted Integrated Deployment Effort (TIDE) will send both uniformed and plainclothes troopers into the most violent areas of the capital city and will be in place for at least one month, according to Hoffman. Troopers have surged in and out of Trenton since January 2012, and officials have spent more than three weeks trying to improve on the initial game plan.
“We were looking for ways we could do things better than our usual mutual aid,” Fuentes said.
“This has been ongoing,” Trenton Police Director Ralph Rivera Jr. said. “Every day, with the Trenton Police Department, we meet with our commanders, we strategize. This is a problem we deal with on a daily basis.”
State troopers and law enforcement officers in North Trenton on an early-morning raid that signaled the start of the State Police Targeted Integrated Deployment Effort (TIDE). The troopers will work alongside city police and other local law enforcement agencies, but will also include members of the state’s Alcoholic Beverage Control bureau to identify problem bars and liquor stores and make sure they are adhering to regulations.
While troopers will hit the streets of Trenton immediately, the second phase of the plan to bring violence under control in Trenton involves the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office. Armed with harsher mandatory minimums for gun crimes thanks to a law signed by Gov. Chris Christie just last week, Hoffman is directing the prosecutor to target weapons violators in the courtrooms.
Now, no plea deal for those charged with gun crimes can be lower than 3 1/2 years, and taking a case to trial will result in a minimum sentence of 10 years if there is a guilty verdict.
“Those come-in-place, one-year, cheap plea deals are no more,” Hoffman said.
“We are taking direct action at offenders and recidivists who are turning Trenton into a shooting range,” he said.
Any offender who brandishes, discharges, defaces the serial number, steals or uses a stolen weapon during a crime will be eligible for the new penalties, Hoffman said.
Violence and frustration
City officers represented by the Policemen’s Benevolent Association expressed skepticism toward the plan. With one city detective still in critical condition last night, and another in stable condition, cops are weary of plans which purport to change the reality they see on the streets, PBA local president George Dzurkoc said.
Dzurkoc blamed Rivera and the department’s leadership for allowing crime to balloon so badly in the first place.
“We’re frustrated, we’re sick and tired of hearing the word ‘initiative,’” Dzurkoc said. “The bottom line is, they took a line on crime that’s way too soft in the city, and this is the end result.”
Yet support for the Republican attorney general’s policy came from the area’s Democratic legislative delegation.
“We’re at a breaking point here,” Assemblyman Reed Gusciora, D-Trenton, said in a statement. “Law abiding citizens should not have to fear leaving their homes and our dedicated police officers should not have to risk their life every time they respond to a call.”
All of the stepped-up law enforcement work is being undertaken alongside a more than 40-member coalition of community activists, from pastors to civic watchdogs to council members. They were privately briefed on the effort before the news conference yesterday and will be asked to bring word and support of it to their neighborhoods, officials said.
While the State Police will be targeting gun violence and gang members, at-large Trenton Councilwoman Kathy McBride told Hoffman she noticed a flaw in the plan: the lack of focus on the drug trade.
“Most of the purchasers for drugs are coming from the suburban parts of our county,” she said.
Hoffman said the State Police deployment focused on crime regionwide.
“Hamilton is in, Ewing is in, all of Mercer County is in,” he said.
“I have a problem if they can go after the dealers but not the ones who are buying,” she said later.
From his City Hall office during a briefing with reporters, Mayor Tony Mack endorsed the State Police-led plan.
“It’s certainly a step in the right direction, and we appreciate that,” Mack said.
Before the attorney general’s news conference, city council members gathered in front of Capital Health Regional Medical Center in Trenton where the wounded detectives were being treated.
“We can’t tolerate this,” said George Muschal, city council president. “The city council’s here for support, but we’re no longer tolerant. We’re going to try do our best, whatever we can do, to stop the violence in the city of Trenton. It’s out of control.”
“Everybody’s doing the best they can,” Councilwoman Marge Caldwell-Wilson said. “We all have to come together, come to the table and say, ‘Okay, we need to act now.’ I don’t know what the answer is but I think we need to be very serious about that. And to think, this is the capital city. My God, legislators. Pay attention.”
“Ideas mean nothing,” Hoffman said. “This is all about results, because results mean lives. If we do not produce results, people will continue to die.”
Staff writers Jenna Pizzi and Mike Davis contributed to this report. Contact Alex Zdan at azdan@njtimes.com or (609) 989-5705.
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