NJ attorney general exceeded authority by taking over Paterson police, court finds

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey’s top law enforcement official overstepped his authority last year when he took control of the police force in Paterson, the state’s third-largest city, soon after police there fatally shot a man barricaded in an apartment bathroom, an appeals court ruled Wednesday.

The New Jersey Appellate Division said Attorney General Matt Platkin had no authority to “supersede,” or take over, Paterson’s police force in March 2023 after the headline-grabbing death of Najee Seabrooks.

The court directed Platkin to return control of the police department to city officials and return Police Chief Engelbert Ribeiro to the city from a police training commission.

“Does the AG have the authority to directly supersede all operations of a municipal police department without the consent of the municipality?” the court asked. “We conclude the answer is no.”

The ruling was put on hold pending appeal, and Platkin vowed to take the case to the state Supreme Court.

“We are deeply disappointed with today’s ruling,” he said in a statement. “We are enormously proud of the extraordinary progress the Paterson Police Department has made and we remain deeply committed to Paterson and to the crucial work of making the City safer for all its people.”

The case provides a window into several crosscurrents involving policing, including how Platkin, a Democrat, navigates police accountability issues he’s sought to champion. The court’s decision also comes as the Biden administration puts other departments under a microscope, including Trenton’s, which it said has a pattern and practice of misconduct.

Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh, a fellow Democrat, criticized Platkin’s takeover and was part of the lawsuit that prevailed on Wednesday.

“This is a victory for democracy,” Sayegh said in a text message. “What Matt Platkin did was unlawful and undemocratic. He disenfranchised Paterson voters to advance his own electoral ambitions.”

The takeover stemmed from a “crisis of confidence” in police in the city, Platkin said last year. Platkin’s action came just weeks after Seabrooks’ death, though he said no single case led to the takeover.

Police were called to Seabrooks’ brother’s apartment, where he had been holed up in the bathroom. Seabrooks, who was a crisis intervention worker and mentor with the nonprofit Paterson Healing Collective, had called 911 at least seven times and told dispatchers that people were threatening him and he needed immediate help.

Police talked to him through the door, offering to get him water and calling him “love” in one instance. But the tension increased when he told police he was armed with a “pocket rocket” gun and a knife. Police shot Seabrooks when he emerged from the bathroom with a knife, according to the attorney general’s office.

Since the takeover, Platkin placed Isa Abbassi, a 25-year veteran of the New York Police Department, in charge of the department.

Platkin’s office said crime in Paterson has diminished since the takeover.

Some activists praised the takeover, including the American Civil Liberties Union, which called it a “welcome step” because of what it said was the department’s history of violent policing. On Wednesday, the group said in a post on X that the court decision threatens to “erode one of the most important tools for police accountability in our state.”

Democratic Assemblymember Benjie Wimberly, who represents the city, said he backed Platkin’s appeal.

“This setback is deeply troubling, especially after nearly two years of concerted efforts and significant investments aimed at strengthening our police department and protecting the people of Paterson,” Wimberly said in a statement.

Paterson has a population of about 160,000 and sits about 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of Manhattan. Its demographics shifted since the middle of the last century when most residents were white. Today, Black residents account for nearly 24% and Hispanics for just over 60% of the population.

As Paterson’s Black population grew, it found itself repeatedly clashing with the city’s white power structure, particularly its police force. Platkin said earlier this year that he wouldn’t blame residents for being distrustful of the police.

In the mid-1960s, Paterson was the site of civil unrest between police and Black residents. Paterson was also the inspiration for the 1975 Bob Dylan song “Hurricane,” about the boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, a Black man who was convicted by an all-white jury in 1967 of killing three white people at a city bar. A federal judge later threw out the conviction, writing that it had been “predicated upon an appeal to racism rather than reason.”

Since the start of 2019, city police fatally shot four people; two others, including Jameek Lowery, have died after being restrained.

The appeals court’s ruling leaves in place Platkin’s takeover of the police department’s internal affairs unit — the group charged with investigating the department itself in certain cases. City officials did not challenge the attorney general’s takeover of that part of the department.

Mike Catalini, The Associated Press