EAST BRUNSWICK – The Attorney General’s Office is conducting an investigation of a fatal motor vehicle accident on Aug. 1 in East Brunswick in which an East Brunswick Police Department vehicle struck and fatally injured an adult male.
The decedent has been identified as Julius Filep, 55, of Edison.
The police officer who was driving the police vehicle that struck Filep has been identified as Officer Mitchell Ngai of the East Brunswick Police Department.
According to the preliminary investigation, Ngai, who was on-duty and in uniform, was operating a marked patrol vehicle on Route 18, responding to a reported motor vehicle accident in the southbound lanes of the roadway. He was traveling northbound in the vicinity of the reported accident at approximately 3:35 a.m. when he struck Filep, who was walking in the roadway in front of 260 Route 18, according to updated information provided by the Attorney General’s Office on Aug. 5.
Medical aid was rendered to Filep, who was transported by ambulance to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where he was pronounced deceased at 4:13 a.m., according to the statement.
This investigation is being conducted pursuant to Attorney General Directive 2019-4, which implements the statutory requirement that the Attorney General’s Office conduct the investigation of any death that occurs during an encounter with a law enforcement officer acting in the officer’s official capacity or while the decedent is in custody, and which establishes clear standards and procedures for conducting such investigations, according to the statement.