Christopher Baxter
nj.com
On an early May morning in 2009, after the State Police had
searched through the night trying to find two burglary suspects in Warren
County, they stopped a car James Bayliss, then 21, was riding in and asked him
to step outside so he could be searched.
What happened next
was captured by a dashboard video camera inside a State Police patrol car. The
recording, which never before has been made public, was recently obtained by
The Star-Ledger.
It shows Bayliss
standing against the car as Staff Sgt. Richard Wambold Jr. frisks him. A few
seconds later, after what appears to be a slight movement, the video shows
Wambold throw Bayliss to the ground, kneel and punch him several times in the
face.
An eyewitness in a
nearby home said in a sworn deposition that she watched from her window as two
troopers, later identified as Wambold and Trooper Keith Juckett, then dragged a
limp, handcuffed Bayliss toward a parked patrol car and rammed his head against
a tire.
She said the
troopers' actions "disgusted" her.
What's more, Bayliss is not an average young man. A car
accident in 2005 left him with a permanent mental disability, and his friend
driving the car that morning, Timothy Snyder, told the State Police troopers on
the scene about his condition before he was beaten.
On Friday, after
being told The Star-Ledger was planning to publish this story and make the
video public on nj.com, the State Police announced for the first time that two
troopers involved in the incident used unreasonable force.
Two sources with knowledge of the case confirmed those
troopers were Wambold and Juckett. They requested anonymity because they were
not authorized to discuss personnel matters.
The announcement came
three years and two weeks after the incident, and after nearly two dozen
attempts by Bayliss and his family to get an answer.
"Attorney
General Jeffrey Chiesa has made it clear that excessive use of force, whether
it involves a state trooper or any other law enforcement officer, will not be
tolerated and will be met with strong and appropriate disciplinary
action," a spokesman for Chiesa, Paul Loriquet, said in a statement.
"This case clearly involved a breach of the Attorney General's policy
regarding use of force."
Reached at his home
Friday, Wambold, a 19-year veteran trooper, declined to comment because of a
State Police policy prohibiting troopers from speaking with the media. Juckett,
a seven-year trooper, could not be reached for comment.
Told of the
development by The Star-Ledger, Bayliss' father, John, was thrilled.
"You don't know
how happy I am," he said. "Finally a step toward closure for our
family."
Wambold said in his
report on the incident in Mansfield Township that Bayliss did several things to
provoke a forceful response. While seated in his car, Bayliss repeatedly failed
to heed instructions, hid his hands and stared menacingly at troopers, Wambold
said.
Wambold said Bayliss
tried to head-butt him during the frisk, and once he was on the ground, he
struck the trooper with a glancing blow to the lower lip. Wambold also said he
smelled alcohol in the car. And Bayliss had been drinking that night, his
father and Snyder said.
"Paramount was the possibility of him being an actor or
accomplice in the home invasion," Wambold, who works out of Netcong,
wrote. He added he was at a "level of heightened caution" because
Bayliss matched the description of one of the burglary suspects.
Bayliss' father said
Wambold mistook his son's disability for defiance.
"I don't think they realized my son was disabled, even
after they were told," John Bayliss said. "I think they were all
jacked up and Wambold took it out on him."
Years Later, An
Answer
The administrative charges of unreasonable force were
substantiated by internal affairs March 23, a spokesman for the State Police,
Lt. Stephen Jones, said in a statement. Officials are still determining what
disciplinary action will be taken.
Jones said the State
Police's investigation began after a supervisor reviewed the incident in 2009,
which is customary when a trooper uses force to make an arrest. He said the
case underwent a "thorough, in-depth" review by multiple state
agencies.
"The Attorney General's
Office, the State Police, as well as the Warren County Prosecutor's Office
engaged in an exhaustive and systematic process, including reviews to determine
if criminal charges were warranted," Jones said. No criminal charges have
been filed.
The Attorney
General's Office said in its statement that while most troopers perform
honorably and with restraint, authorities must "ensure that force is used
only as appropriate and authorized to protect the officer and others" and
to maintain the public's trust.
The attorney
general's guidelines state that a police officer is justified to use physical
force as protection, to overcome resistance, to make an arrest and to protect
property.
In 2004, Wambold was
honored by the State Police with the Distinguished Service Medal for shooting
an armed suspect in Warren County a year earlier after the suspect had shot a
local police officer.