Controversial May 1, 2003 Hopewell Township tape now available

Copies of the tape, shot by a security camera affixed to the wall behind then-Committeewoman Arlene Kemp’s seat, are available for $5 each at township police headquarters.

By John Tredrea
   A videotape of the May 1, 2003 Hopewell Township Committee meeting, released Wednesday, clearly shows then-Committeewoman Arlene Kemp pick up then-Deputy Mayor Marylou Ferrara’s planning book from the dais, place it several feet away from Ms. Ferrara’s empty place and then gather it up with her own belongings as she left.
   Ms. Kemp, who already has admitted taking the planner, has said it was accidental.
   The tape then shows Ms. Kemp putting Ms. Ferrara’s planning book down atop her own (Ms. Kemp’s) things, then picking everything up and walking out of the municipal auditorium as Ms. Ferrara herself approached the dais to gather up her materials from the aborted committee meeting.
   Copies of the tape, shot by a security camera affixed to the wall behind Ms. Kemp’s seat, are available to the public for $5 each at township police headquarters. Copies of the tapes became available Wednesday morning. One was viewed by the Hopewell Valley News.
   Township Attorney Steve Goodell said Tuesday that the Township Committee had decided in a closed session Monday night to release the tape for several reasons.
   "Recent decisions of the Government Records Council make it clear that criminal investigatory records need not be disclosed — even in cases where the investigation is closed," Mr. Goodell said in a written statement: "However, given the unique circumstances present here, including the fact that nobody has pressed charges, the Mercer County prosecutor has withdrawn his objection to releasing the tape, the chief of police has no objection to releasing the tape, and the subject of the tape (Ms. Kemp) has no objection to its release, the chief of police will make a copy of the tape available. We want to stress that releasing the tape does not create any precedent, and that Hopewell Township maintains its right to keep criminal investigatory records and surveillance tapes confidential, as the law allows."
   Former Committeeman Robert Higgins recently filed a lawsuit against the township, demanding to see the tape. Mr. Higgins, who had publicly been calling for the release of the tape for months prior to filing his lawsuit, said the public had a right to see the tape so that it could "evaluate Arlene’s behavior."
   Ms. Kemp, a Republican, was elected to the Committee in 2002, along with Democrat Vanessa Sandom, with whom Ms. Kemp ran as a slate. In that election, Mr. Higgins, a Democrat, failed in his bid to land a second three-year term on the committee. In a written statement released Monday, Ms. Kemp said she suspects that Mr. Higgins’ attempt to get the tape released is politically motivated.
   "Bob Higgins has filed a lawsuit against the township, demanding to be allowed to see a surveillance tape made in May 2003," Ms. Kemp said in her statement Wednesday. "I suspect that his lawsuit is politically motivated, since more than two years ago, then Deputy Mayor Higgins faced myself, a newcomer, in a bid for the Township Committee. I won over Mr. Higgins in 10 of the 11 districts. Hopewell has seen enough political squabbling. It’s time to move on … I will not allow Mr. Higgins to distract us from our goals of serving the public good."
   Because Mayor Fran Bartlett was absent from the May 1, 2003 committee meeting, Ms. Ferrara presided, since she was deputy mayor. Ms. Ferrara and Ms. Kemp, who was sitting on Ms. Ferrara’s left, argued intensely throughout the meeting. At one point, Ms. Kemp picked up the gavel from the dais, where it rested in front of Ms. Ferrara. Ms. Ferrara got out of her seat and attempted to retrieve the gavel Ms. Kemp had taken from her, but Ms. Kemp picked it up again and moved it where Ms. Ferrara could not reach it. At that point, Ms. Ferrara rolled her eyes incredulously, gave up the effort to get the gavel back, sat down and presided over the rest of the meeting with no gavel.
   (The argument focused on whether or not the committee should entertain a resolution, written by Ms. Kemp, stating that the township should not pay any legal expenses Committeeman Jon Edwards might incur as a result of a threatened lawsuit prompted by allegations Mr. Edwards had made in an e-mail earlier that year. Mr. Edwards later retracted the accusations and no lawsuit was filed.)
   Not long afterward, both she and Committeeman Jon Edwards stormed out of the municipal auditorium, leaving only Ms. Kemp and Ms. Sandom on the dais. Since a quorum of at least three of the committee’s five members is needed for a meeting to proceed, nothing could happen and the meeting was eventually adjourned.
   As the tape shows, Ms. Kemp subsequently left the dais as well. She returned to it shortly before 9:50 p.m. Ms. Ferrara was not on the dais, but her papers and planning book were on it. The seat on Ms. Kemp’s left was vacant, as it had been all night due to Ms. Bartlett’s absence. The tape shows Ms. Kemp picking up Ms. Ferrara’s opened planning book, which was on the right side of Ms. Ferrara’s space on the dais, several feet away from where Ms. Kemp’s own papers lay.
   After picking up Ms. Ferrara’s planning book, Ms. Kemp walked a few steps to her left and carried the book to the area behind her own seat. Ms. Kemp then put the now-closed planning book down on top of her own papers. She then picked up everything, the planning book still in view atop her other materials, and left the dais and began walking out of the municipal auditorium as Ms. Ferrara approached the dais.
   The tape is not a continuously running record. Rather, it a series of digital photographs, taken at four-second intervals.
   A few days after the meeting, Ms. Kemp called Ms. Ferrara, saying she had taken her planning book accidentally because it looked like her own book. Ms. Ferrara replied that she had already reported the book stolen and told Ms. Kemp she would only take it back if Ms. Kemp brought it to the police station. Ms. Ferrara said within days of the May 1 meeting that she had viewed that tape and that, in her mind, it showed Ms. Kemp taking the planning book deliberately. Ms. Ferrara also told the HVN that, when she picked up her planning book from the police station, nothing was missing, but everything in it had obviously been gone through because the papers were arranged in it much differently from how she had left them.
   Ms. Ferrara also said that the fact there is a picture of one of her children in the planning book added to her belief that it was impossible for Ms. Kemp to have picked up the planning book accidentally, as Ms. Kemp has maintained ever since the controversy over the incident erupted in early May 2003.
   During the initial controversy, the township police put the tape in an evidence locker in police headquarters, in case Ms. Ferrara decided to press charges against Ms. Kemp. She did not, nor did the prosecutor’s office nor any other law enforcement agency. The one-year statute of limitations on Ms. Ferrara’s pressing charges ran out in May 2004, but the police continued to refuse to release the tape because that was what the township had been advised to do by the prosecutor.