Superintendent Dunbar Comments on Accusations

But with all of that, the key is much simpler, state police Superintendent Carson Dunbar told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. "Probably the biggest thing is that I`ve met with every trooper in the state of New Jersey," said Dunbar, who became superintendent in October 1999.

"I explained to them what my expectations are," Dunbar said. "My responsibility is to set the tone."

"There are those who just don`t get it," he said. "They are people who I think don`t have any place in law enforcement."

But generally, he said, state troopers are honest and "they haven`t missed a beat" despite the controversy swirling around them since an April 1998 turnpike shooting.

"Do we have all the problems solved? No. But we are doing pretty good," he said. "I want them, when they get out there, to be strong enough to make decisions for themselves."

Dunbar and Attorney General John Farmer testified Tuesday about steps they have taken, from new practices to new hardware, many in response to the legal settlement reached with the U.S. Justice Department in December 1999.

Sen. John Lynch, D-Middlesex, was unimpressed. "No one is leading this parade," he said.

Lynch is the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary committee. He said the failure of the Whitman administration from 1996 to 1999, which has been the focus of three weeks of hearings, has not been adequately rectified in the years since.

"It is nice to put a bow on it and call it reform," Lynch said. "I haven`t seen any real reforms."

"How can you rationalize this taking so long? Someone has to step up and lead, and if it is not going to be the executive branch, it has to be the Legislature," he said.

Farmer said, "It has taken too long, there is no question about it."

"I think in the past one of the things that has led to racial profiling is an absence of supervision that we are putting in place," he said.

Farmer said newly installed tracking computers in particular give officials unprecedented ability to quickly compile and analyze data about traffic stops and searches. For instance, he greeted the committee Tuesday with a new report showing 73 percent of motorists who were searched on the New Jersey Turnpike last year were minorities, a trend he called "extremely troubling."

In a report covering 1994 to 1996, minority motorists were involved in 84 percent of searches.

Farmer also said the ability to examine the facts behind specific traffic stops is more important than compiling trends. "We are really moving toward the system in which you can make individual judgments, and you are not going to be captive of gross statistics anymore," he said.

Dunbar agreed. "We have gotten so hung up on stats. I have stats coming in every day," he said.

(Copyright 2001 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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Author: 6 ABC - Action News (AP)