Use of force incidents high among cops who attended controversial police training conference

Most of the New Jersey law enforcement officers who attended a controversial training conference in 2021 that state investigators say glorified violence have used force on people during arrests and other encounters, a New Jersey Monitor examination found.

Seventy-two percent of the 240 officers who attended Street Cop’s six-day forum in Atlantic City have used force at least once since October 2020, when the state began publicly reporting such incidents. More than 170 of the attendees used force 796 times total, state records show.

Twenty-two officers logged at least 10 use-of-force incidents during that time period, with two cops in Trenton — where the police department is under federal investigation for violent, unconstitutional arrests — racking up a combined 45. Almost a third of the attendees used force more than four times, which is the statewide average of incidents per officer who uses force, according to a 2018 investigation by NJ.com.

The New Jersey Monitor obtained a list of attendees from the state Attorney General’s Office through a public records request.

Street Cop, a New Jersey-based firm started in 2012 by a former Woodbridge cop, has been under fire since an attendee publicly leaked recordings of its October 2021 conference in Atlantic City. Several instructors at the confab preached a militaristic approach to policing, bragged and joked about shooting people, and taught tactics that acting State Comptroller Kevin Walsh deemed unconstitutional.

While officers sometimes have legitimate reasons to use force in policing, reformers say the large proportion of Street Cop attendees with documented uses of force raises red flags.

“One question is whether the training that’s being done is inducing people to engage in uses of force that are maybe not justified. And in the other direction, the question is whether people who are already inclined towards improper policing tactics are also inclined to attend these kinds of unregulated trainings,” said Michael Noveck, a deputy public defender in the state Office of the Public Defender’s special litigation unit.

Street Cop, which declared bankruptcy earlier this year, still trains officers and has an annual conference planned in Florida in late April even though several states including New Jersey have barred their officers from the firm’s training.

Beyond use of force

Walsh and his investigators found some instructors also presented materials that were sexually inappropriate and harassing, offensive to marginalized groups, discriminatory, and insubordinate.

But police disciplinary records in New Jersey are not public — something reformers have long lobbied to change. Only major discipline — that’s sustained allegations of wrongdoing resulting in at least five days of suspension — is publicly reported. That reporting just started in 2021.

Just two cops who attended Street Cop’s 2021 conference had publicly reported major discipline — a Bordentown officer suspended for 15 days for tackling and beating a fleeing burglary suspect after he stopped and put his hands up and a Lincoln Park officer suspended for 20 days for being uncooperative and disrespectful while off duty to other officers investigating a disorderly persons report. The chiefs of those departments did not respond to requests for comment.

That lack of full public reporting means the public can’t check whether their officers have a tendency to trample civil rights in ways that don’t involve the use of force — things like racially motivated car stops or unwarranted searches and seizures.

The Street Cop training serves as a good reminder of why such transparency is needed, Noveck said.

“The more this is in the public eye, the better the public and attorneys of people who are accused of crimes will be able to ensure that constitutional rights aren’t infringed upon,” he said.

Defense attorneys have warned that cases involving officers who attended Street Cop training could collapse in court, and Noveck said his office is checking the list of Street Cop attendees against their current caseload, with an eye out for constitutional concerns.

Attorney General Matt Platkin ordered the 240 officers who attended Street Cop’s 2021 conference to be retrained next week in Trenton, ordered reimbursements for that conference to be suspended, and directed the state Police Training Commission to consider statewide guidelines for acceptable police training provided by outside vendors.

Some reformers say more must be done.

Penns Grove Police Department Director Richard Rivera, who has long advocated for police transparency and accountability, pointed out that thousands of officers have attended Street Cop trainings outside of the 2021 conference. Street Cop claims to be the largest police training company nationally, teaching 25,000 to 30,000 officers every year, including more than 2,000 from New Jersey.

Retraining just the 2021 attendees — when Street Cop has been in operation for 12 years — and investigating just one police training firm when others also train cops without oversight “is not fair,” Rivera said.

“They’re singling out one incident,” he said. “Basically, the current instructors for Street Cop and the attendees are being scapegoated for systemic flaws.”

He seconded many of the recommendations Walsh made in his December report, like requiring the state Police Training Commission to oversee and vet all police training courses — which could be a tough task because it’s a “severely underfunded, understaffed” organization, Rivera added.

Pam Kruger, a spokeswoman for Walsh’s office, said investigators there did not investigate uses of force by officers who attended Street Cop’s training.

Still, she noted, “our report found that the 2021 Street Cop Conference glorified violence and promoted a hyper-militaristic approach to policing that is inconsistent with police reform efforts in New Jersey. For that reason and others, we recommended that every officer who attended the training be retrained and that every law enforcement agency require officers to report any training they attended. Quality police training is critical to keeping both the police and the public safe.”