More than four years ago, a NJ man returning from a party had sealed candies in his car. The police said they thought the candies were drugs. Now, he's suing them for wrongful arrest and is facing off against the officers' claim of qualified immunity.
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2022.More than four years ago, Palisades Interstate Parkway Police in New Jersey pulled over Fernando Saint-Jean. They found three sealed bags of candy in his car, and charged him with drug possession, without testing the drugs or following up on his offer to get them in touch with the coworker who's gifted him the candies in the first place.
And so he cooperates, he does everything the police officer tells him to do, which is everything from, you know, "Show me your ID," [to] "Get out of the car." He frisks both him and his uncle, who was riding in the passenger seat. He asked what country they were from. They were Black. Saint-Jean is from Haiti, but he is a citizen here.
All right. So then in 2019, Saint-John filed a lawsuit against the police for wrongful arrest. What's been happening since then? It is, yeah. This is the nut of it. So qualified immunity basically protects police officers, law enforcement officers, from personal liability when they violate someone's constitutional rights.
So New Jersey's criminal justice community has zeroed in on qualified immunity as one of the main things that they're trying to get reformed. And yes, there have been several bills that have been introduced in the New Jersey Legislature on this, for years. They've never gained any traction. It depends on who you talk to, whether there's any hope that they'll actually move.