State prosecutors on Monday criminally charged a Paterson police officer who shot a man in the back, leaving him unable to walk.
“This is a solemn moment to bring charges like this,” state Attorney General Matthew Platkin said at a Trenton press conference announcing the counts of aggravated assault and official misconduct against Officer Jerry Moravek in connection with the June 2022 shooting of Khalif Cooper.
It is rare for a New Jersey law enforcement officer to be criminally charged in an on-duty shooting. But at least a dozen of Paterson officers have been accused of misconduct or excessive force in recent years.
Video footage of the encounter shows Moravek shooting Cooper as he ran and then approaching the 28-year-old and asking while he was on the ground, “Why did you run from me?”
“I was scared,” Cooper said. “But I don’t got no gun, though.”
Platkin said New Jersey police officers are bound by his office’s use of force policies, which limit when cops can fire upon suspects. The encounter between Moravek and Cooper, Platkin said, fell “so far so outside of these confines — shooting an unarmed man in the back, resulting in a serious injury — that criminal charges are appropriate.”
Moravek’s actions were defended by Paterson’s mayor and the officer’s attorney, who said he acted appropriately to reports of shots fired near a large gathering.
“The officer ran towards the shots fired and pursued an individual whom he believed to have a gun,” Andre Sayegh, the city’s mayor, said in a statement. “While it is unfortunate that an individual was shot, a preliminary review reveals that the officer was following guidelines. Several guns and shell casings were recovered from the scene.”
Passaic County authorities at the time of the shooting also said Cooper had a gun. But state authorities said body camera footage and other evidence shows Cooper was unarmed when Moravek shot him.
“The body worn camera footage does not depict the victim brandishing any firearm or pointing a firearm at the defendant, other officers or any member of the public,” a statement from Platkin’s office said. “No gun was found in the victim’s possession nor within his reach.”
A seven-minute video clip released by Passaic County prosecutors last year shows Moravek arriving at a gathering on a public street and telling everyone to leave, saying neighbors were complaining. Later, gunshots are heard in the background as the officer runs toward the noise, reporting “shot fired.”
Cooper, wearing a white sweatshirt, flashes onto the screen running and Moravek pursues him, yelling “drop the gun! Drop the gun!” before firing twice, the video shows. Cooper collapsed on the ground, bullet fragments lodged in his spine, authorities said.
Officers recovered several weapons from the area, but testing did not find Cooper’s DNA or fingerprints on them, according to a copy of the criminal complaint obtained by NJ Advance Media.
Patrick Caserta, the officer’s attorney, said Moravek fired because he believed ”the person he was chasing was turning to fire that handgun at him and he realized that if he missed, the bullets could strike anyone nearby.
“He made that split-second decision and fired his weapon.”
If convicted, Moravek, 40, faces up to a decade in prison on each charge.
The incident is another setback for the police department in Paterson, New Jersey’s third-largest city, where at least 12 officers have been criminally charged for misconduct in four years, and officials have paid $2 million to settle 16 civil rights lawsuits filed against police in the last three.
Cooper, who has not been criminally charged, could not be reached for comment.
Under state use of force guidelines, police officers can shoot a fleeing suspect only if their escape would cause an “imminent threat” to an officer or bystander. In this case, the Platkin told reporters, “the victim was never told to stop running.”
“He was never warned that deadly force might be used,” the attorney general said. “Unfortunately, the fact remains that Moravek fired at an unarmed subject, running away, without giving proper warnings.”
S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter.
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