The Policemen’s Benevolent Association Local 119, which was included as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against Lawrence Township and Police Chief Brian Caloiaro, has been withdrawn from the lawsuit.
PBA Local 119 was listed as one of the plaintiffs, along with patrol officers Marc Caponi, Andres Mejia, Hector Nieves, Sgt. Scott Stein, Detective Andrew Lee and Lt. Joseph Amodio, who initiated the lawsuit that was filed Oct. 7 in Mercer County Superior Court.
Caponi and Mejia are the president and vice president, respectively, of PBA Local 119.
“Plaintiff hereby voluntarily withdraws Policemen’s Benevolent Association Local 119 from the litigation,” according to a Nov. 14 court filing made in Mercer County Superior Court by attorney Christopher Gray, who represents the plaintiffs.
Gray represents the six police officers who brought the lawsuit. They remain as plaintiffs.
The lawsuit claims that police officers are under pressure to issue traffic tickets to make up for a revenue shortfall in Lawrence Township Municipal Court. Fines are one of the sources of revenue for the municipal budget.
The lawsuit claims the police officers “have been retaliated against for trying to stop an illegal ticket quota system used to fund the operations of Lawrence Township at the expense of motorists traveling through Lawrence Township.”
The lawsuit also claims that Chief Caloiaro and Lawrence Township have “systematically developed a system to siphon as much money as possible from motorists by demanding cars be impounded by officers, which cost a motorist over $300 more than the motor vehicle ticket.” The fee cannot be appealed to the Municipal Court judge.
The police officers are seeking judgment against Chief Caloiaro and Lawrence Township for violating their civil rights and for violating the New Jersey Conscientious Employee Protection Act for being whistle-blowers.
The police officers claim that in a departmental meeting in September 2018, Chief Caloiaro emphasized the need to issue more traffic tickets because “revenue (from Lawrence Township Municipal Court) was down.” He repeated it again in March 2019, the lawsuit said.
During the annual budget meetings held by Lawrence Township Council, Municipal Court Judge Lewis Korngut said the decline in Municipal Court revenue for 2018 was an aberration, and that now it was on the “upswing.”
At the same Feb. 19 budget meeting in which Judge Korngut commented on the decline in revenue, Chief Caloiaro attributed a decline in the number of traffic tickets issued as “decreased morale,” the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit claims that Chief Caloiaro’s response to the decline in revenue was to order the police officers to issue more traffic tickets. He posted the number of tickets issued by each police officer as a means to “shame” them into writing more tickets, the lawsuit said.
But Municipal Manager Kevin Nerwinski said a quota system for traffic tickets does not exist and is, in fact, illegal. He also dismissed allegations that police officers were encouraged to deliberately impound motor vehicles to generate more revenue.
Nerwinski acknowledged that impounding motor vehicles and raising revenue from their storage is true “to some degree.”
It was former Police Chief Mark Ubry’s idea to create a small impound yard behind the police department’s headquarters. It would make it easier for the owner to retrieve the vehicle and also generate revenue for the township, Nerwinski said.
But a vehicle is only impounded if a police officer discovers, during a motor vehicle stop, that it is not registered or that the registration is suspended. Police officers are required by law to impound those motor vehicles, and there is no discretion.
Nerwinski said that the budget discussions regarding Lawrence Township Municipal Court revenue were related to preparing the 2019 municipal budget.
It is impossible to create a responsible budget “if you don’t discuss and determine and forecast what revenues will be realized in the coming budget year,” he said.
Nerwinski also defended Chief Caloiaro as a “good, honest, hard-working and dedicated police chief” who is undeserving of the criticism and allegations that have been leveled against him.