The 17-year veteran of the department takes the position vacated by Capt. Robert Roscoe.
By: Purvi Desai
Paul Merkler, a 17-year veteran of the Hillsborough Police Department, was promoted to captain during the March 27 Township Committee meeting.
Capt. Merkler takes the position vacated by Capt. Robert Roscoe, who retired after 25 years from the Hillsborough Police Department on Feb. 1, after moving to South Carolina.
Capt. Merkler, 41, of Edison, will receive an annual salary of $119,189, according to the resolution approving his promotion.
Capt. Merkler started at the Hillsborough Police Department in 1992 as a patrol officer and worked in that position for four and a half years. For the next six months, he said he worked as a traffic officer, before being appointed patrol corporal for the next two years.
In 1997, Capt. Merkler was promoted to sergeant, and after a year, tapped as the department’s traffic sergeant for four years. He was promoted to lieutenant in 2002 and spent one year as the administrative division commander at the Police Department.
From 2003 to 2006, Capt. Merkler said he was services division commander, and from the last year until his promotion, he was the patrol division commander.
"My duties are to oversee operations that encompass the patrol division and the investigative division," Capt. Merkler said of his new role, adding that those are his primary responsibilities, although he will also be involved in other things in the department. "We’re looking forward to good things," Capt. Merkler said of himself and his colleagues at the Police Department.
The department also recently promoted James McConnell, 49, of Hillsborough, to lieutenant at an annual salary of $111,110; and Charles Boyle, 41, of Somerset, and Sean Carolan, 39, of Hillsborough, were promoted to sergeants at annual salaries of $91,856, all effective April 1.
The promotions cap a round of departmental changes launched by last year’s promotion of Paul Kaminsky, who was a lieutenant at the time, to chief after the retirement of Robert Gazaway.

