NJ State Police recruits graduate

A State Police trooper has filed a whistleblower lawsuit alleging background check problems were ignored for State Police academy applications to boost diversity. Members of the State Police academy's 153rd class march into the Thomas G. Dunn Sports Center in Elizabeth on December 6, 2013 for the graduation ceremony. (John Munson/The Star-Ledger)

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TRENTON - A veteran state trooper alleges in a whistleblower lawsuit she was retaliated against by her superiors after raising objections that police academy background checks were compromised because of pressure to increase racial diversity among State Police ranks.

Acting Sgt. Jaclyn Jiras, who spent five months working as a background investigator at a time the division was being scrutinized for its lack of black cadets, claims she was reassigned and denied a promotion when she flagged applicants with troubled legal histories and criminal backgrounds.

Court records and administrative documents obtained by NJ Advance Media also show Jiras and another trooper, acting Sgt. Christopher Griffin, were disciplined for allegedly leaking information from confidential background investigations to a retired trooper who ran a Facebook group for State Police members.

Jiras claims in her suit that her superiors, under pressure from the state Attorney General's Office to boost recruit class diversity on short notice, approved candidates who had been automatically disqualified for having suspended licenses, criminal affiliations and active warrants.

The lawsuit names the state of New Jersey, the State Police, Superintendent Col. Rick Fuentes, and Capt. Mark Santiago as defendants.

Spokesmen for the State Police and Attorney General's Office declined to comment on the allegations.

MOST DIVERSE CLASS

Jiras was responsible for conducting background checks for the division's 152nd and 153rd academy classes in 2012 and 2013, according to the lawsuit, filed Feb. 10 in Superior Court in Mercer County.

Both classes were touted in succession as the most diverse in State Police history. But they came only after the New Jersey chapter of the NAACP threatened legal action because the division had accepted a class with just five black troopers in 2011.

The 2011 drop in black recruits was seen as particularly troubling for the State Police, which historically struggled to grow its ranks of racial minority and female troopers but was publicly increasing its outreach efforts. The division also had spent a decade under federal monitoring for racial profiling and entered into a settlement with the NAACP in 2000 that mandated improved minority recruiting.

"We're not looking to change the process or lower the standards," said Melvin Warren, the criminal justice chairman for the state NAACP who has worked with State Police on recruitment efforts. "But we live in a diverse state. That's a fact. The makeup of the State Police needs to represent the state of New Jersey."

Warren declined to comment on the case because he was not familiar with the specific allegations.

Jiras' attorney, Katherine Hartman, said her client was not opposed to diversity efforts, but raised objections because the division was taking shortcuts.

"The way to (increase diversity) is through mentorship programs, forming partnerships with local police departments -- not through manipulating the process," Hartman said.

The suit claims Jiras and a colleague flagged a number of individuals who failed background checks based on 24 "automatic disqualifiers" set forth by the state attorney general.

One candidate had been found guilty of tax evasion and had a suspended driver's license, another had an active criminal warrant and a third candidate's Facebook account showed ties to the Bloods street gang as well as posts from the applicant "making race-based comments," the suit alleges.

Jiras claims she and her coworkers later learned several of those disqualified applicants had been "forced into the process" anyway amid pressure from Gov. Chris Christie's administration.

"Because the Academy was to start shortly and the Attorney General's Office determined it wanted additional 'diversity,' twenty minority candidates who had been automatically disqualified and were no longer part of the process were removed from the disqualification list and put back into the process," the complaint states.

The lawsuit does not indicate if any of the flagged candidates were accepted for State Police training, but administrative documents show some of the candidates the troopers flagged were sent on to the academy.

"This is at the highest levels," Hartman said. "You had captains objecting and saying, 'What's going on?' And there were people higher than them sending (the applicant roster) back. The answer was, 'The governor's office said the class was not diverse enough.'"

A spokesman for the governor's office declined to comment.

DISCIPLINARY CASE ONGOING

When Jiras complained, she said her supervisors retaliated by removing her from background investigations and denying her a scheduled promotion to sergeant in May 2014. Another trooper with no experience in background investigations was assigned to replace her, according to the complaint.

"Out of the seven background investigations Jiras conducted, six candidates were disqualified and one withdrew," the lawsuit states. "When the next class came, Jiras was informed that she would not be doing background investigations as she was 'too good' at her job."

According to the complaint, Jiras also learned in March 2014 that she was being investigated over a conversation she had on her private Facebook account with a trooper who had recently become permanently disabled and medically separated from the State Police.

The suit does not detail the conversation, but disciplinary documents obtained by NJ Advance Media through an Open Public Records Act request show Jiras and Griffin each allegedly shared confidential information with the retired State Police detective using the social networking site.

In December 2014 disciplinary records signed by Fuentes, the two were accused of leaking details of recruits' backgrounds to the trooper, who was then an administrator for a Facebook group called "TheOutfit1921." The private group has more than 1,100 members and is described as consisting of "current and retired members of the New Jersey State Police."

Jiras allegedly "disclosed the name of an applicant, who became a State Trooper, and specific information regarding his reinstatement back to the applicant investigation process after he had been automatically disqualified twice," according to one disciplinary document.

Griffin allegedly leaked "that he had been ordered by a Lieutenant Colonel not to make an arrest regarding an active warrant on an applicant," the document states. "(Griffin) further disclosed that minority applicants, who had been automatically disqualified during their (background checks), were still sent to the academy 'due to NAACP issues.'"

Jiras claims in her suit that when she learned about the internal affairs investigation, she also discovered that her internal e-mail messages relating to her work as a background investigator had been deleted by a systems administrator.

Hartman said she and Jiras detailed their concerns about the recruit vetting process in a January 2015 letter to the State Police's Office of Professional Standards, but have received no response.

Jiras and Griffin are appealing the disciplinary charges through the state Office of Administrative Law and the case is pending, records show.

Anna Merriman may be reached at amerriman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @anna_merriman. Find The Times of Trenton on Facebook.

S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

