PARTIAL VERDICT
Former police chief guilty of lying to feds, jury still deliberating on other charges
CAMDEN >> A jury found former Bordentown Police chief Frank Nucera guilty of lying to the FBI after he repeatedly denied going “hands on” with a handcuffed black suspect at a township hotel in September 2016.
Nucera, 62, didn’t react as the jury forewoman, one of the three black jurors on the 12-member panel, soberly delivered the verdict just before 4:30 p.m. Wednesday following about 37 hours of deliberations over six days.
The jury was handed the case Oct. 2 following closing arguments in which the two sides painted dueling portraits of Nucera: the prosecution as a stone-cold racist top cop who wanted to teach a black Trenton teen a “lesson” and allowed his beliefs to infiltrate how his department police the predominantly white town and the defense as a distinguished military man who deeply cared about Bordentown and served it for more than three decades, part of that time in dual roles.
The jury passed a note to U.S. District Court Judge Robert Kugler around 4:20 p.m. saying it reached a verdict on count three of the indictment. Nucera was found guilty of lying to FBI special agents investigating the alleged hate-crime assault of Timothy Stroye at the Ramada Inn on Sept. 1, 2016.
The jury appears undecided on two remaining counts of hate-crime assault and deprivation of civil rights, each carrying up to 10 years. Jurors briefly went back into the deliberations room to decide whether they could reach a verdict on the other counts. They will return Thursday morning to inform the judge whether they intend to continue deliberating.
“We’re gonna wait and see what happens tomorrow,” defense attorney Rocco Cipparone Jr. said outside the courtroom. “Of the three counts, this is the lesser of three evils. That doesn’t mean I’m happy with it. But it is what it is and I have to accept it at this point.”
Nucera faces up to five years in prison for lying to the feds when he’s sentenced Feb. 6, but his attorney doesn’t expect the 34year police veteran will get “anywhere near” the maximum penalty.
Nucera, who made more than $150,000 as police chief and another $20,000 to share duties as township administrator, also faces the loss of his six-figure pension, which has been frozen since March. He retired in January 2017 amid the FBI probe.
“He’s frankly shocked by it because if you’re the person who was there and know you didn’t do it, it’s disheartening after a 34year career to be in that position,” Cipparone Jr. said. “He took it with grace, but he doesn’t like it.”
The charges stemmed from a police call to the township hotel after a manager mistakenly believed Stroye, then 18, and his 16-year-old girlfriend were swimming in the pool without paying for a room.
Stroye was arrested following a scuffle with Lt. Shawn Mount. Mount described it as the fight for his life.
Prosecutors said Nucera slammed the handcuffed Stroye’s head into a door jamb as he was being escorted from the secondfloor hotel stairwell to a police cruiser. The defense denied Nucera ever put his hands on the Trenton teen, and the police chief made no admissions on dozens of secret recordings made by a colleague.
Sgt. Nathan Roohr testified at the three-week trial that he saw the police chief grab and slam Stroye’s head “like a basketball” into the metal door jamb. Roohr turned over 81 secret recordings of Nucera using racial slurs, including about Stroye within hours of the alleged attack.
The chief also compared blacks to the terrorist organization ISIS, claimed they had “no value” and remarked that President Donald Trump was the “last hope” for white America.
Detective Sgt. Sal Guido also implicated Nucera with striking Stroye but described it as more of push and refused to say it constituted excessive force. He called the chief’s actions “uncalled for” and embarrassing.
Cipparone urged jurors to discount the testimony of the two allegedly disgruntled cops. He said they wanted Nucera out because he was a disciplinarian who employed cutthroat managerial tactics.
It was unclear how jurors believe Nucera intentionally misled FBI special agents Vernon Addison and Arthur Durrant III during a Dec. 22 interview at the Iron Skillet restaurant at the Petro truck stop in the township.
During the 50-some minutes interview, which Addison secretly video-recorded, Nucera repeatedly denied touching or hitting Stroye.
“I didn’t go hands on with anyone,” Nucera said on the video, played for jurors at the trial. “As far as I can remember, I stayed upstairs with Shawn. … I didn’t go hands on. I didn’t touch anybody, didn’t spray [them]. I didn’t touch anybody. I had nothing to do with the physical arrest.”
Durrant at one point pressed the police chief about whether there’d be any “truth” to someone accusing him of using excessive force. The chief again denied striking anyone.
The chief said he “never had a civil rights complaint against me” in all his time on the force. He told the FBI he would have “absolutely” stepped in if he saw another cop using excessive force.
Nucera told agents their questions about the Ramada incident “caught me off guard. To me, it was another call at the hotel. I wouldn’t have even showed up if there wasn’t a call for help.”
Cipparone said the jury could have considered “four or five different potential statements” Nucera made that they believed were materially false during the FBI interview.
“There were all variations of did he go ‘hands on,’ but there was also one that said, ‘I didn’t touch him. I wasn’t involved in the processing,’” the defense attorney said. “It could even be one of those latter statements. It’s a little bit of a guessing game there as to what statement they believed [he lied about].”
Stroye, who complained of a possible concussion in a police lockup video played for jurors, did not take the stand in the trial.
Jurors asked for transcripts of testimony for all but two of the nine witnesses in the case, and indicated at one point they were deadlocked on all counts. The judge recharged the jury and it eventually returned the partial verdict.
Cipparone said he and Nucera are still on “pins and needles” over what Thursday could bring. Jurors return to the courthouse at 9:30 a.m.
“If I had a crystal ball and knew the answer, I’d be sitting on a beach in Aruba as opposed to here,” Cipparone said. “I don’t think anything was easy for this jury. If it was that easy they would have done it Day 1.”