Middletown mom turned life around dramatically since 2007 charge; NJ law doesn't care Nikki Tierney is haunted by her 2007 guilty plea for child endangerment. Her story shows the need for expungements.

Jerry Carino | Asbury Park Press

Show Caption Hide Caption A Middletown mom's journey to rehabilitation Nikki Tierney makes a case for why New Jersey needs a better expungement process.

Linda Jones broke down and cried. Although she’s been clean for 15 years after beating a crack-cocaine addiction, the grandmother of four couldn’t find housing because she pleaded guilty to drug-possession charges in 2002.

She was homeless, sleeping on friends couches and volunteering at a local nonprofit, when an affordable-housing opportunity arose in Asbury Park. Her application was denied. On Nov. 1 the Asbury Park Press chronicled Jones’ story, including a video of tears rolling down her cheeks as she discussed the rejection.

Nikki Tierney watched it and understood the pain. The next day, she tracked Jones down through social media and promised to help her. After a flurry of calls, Tierney found a sympathetic landlord and an apartment in Asbury Park.

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Tierney’s daughter Amanda donated all of her bedroom furniture to Jones. Tierney’s sons, Kyle and Kole, strapped Amanda’s bed to the roof of Kyle's car and drove it from their Middletown home to Jones’ new apartment. They took it apart to get it through the door, then reassembled it inside. Tierney’s other daughter, Ashley, donated her laptop to Linda.

“I went unheard for so many years,” Jones said. “When Nikki came into my life, it was like my prayers were answered.”

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Nikki Tierney came to Jones’ rescue for two reasons. One, she’s a good person, a pillar of her community. Don’t take my word for it. Take the word of a U.S. Marshal, an addiction counselor, her boss in the real estate business and a prominent high school basketball coach, all of whom are quoted in this column.

Two, she’s walking in similar shoes.

While caught in the throes of addiction, Tierney committed a nonviolent crime in 2007. She is a different person now and has been for several years, but her guilty plea still hangs from her neck like a scarlet letter. Next year at this time, Nikki will earn a master’s degree from Monmouth University in clinical mental health counseling, with a specialization in addiction studies. That should open the door to becoming a licensed alcohol and drug counselor, a job she seems extraordinarily well-suited for.

But there’s a problem: Per New Jersey law, she can’t get the crime expunged. Without expungement, her employment prospects are grim, and this 47-year-old single mom and her four children will continue to pay a disproportionate price for a nonviolent offense from 12 years ago. Nikki couldn’t even coach their rec-league sports teams, even though she is a former basketball star at Mater Dei High School who went on to earn Academic All-America honors in college.

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“In counseling we talk about making amends,” Tierney said. “Everybody thinks amends is saying sorry. Amends is making change. I’ve said I’m sorry. I am sorry.

“There is nobody who punishes themselves more harshly for that day (in 2007) — the day before that, the day after that, what everybody went through — than me. But I’ve changed to the maximum possible extent. I don’t know what else to do.”

There is a bill working its way through the state Legislature that would give rehabilitated New Jerseyans such as Tierney and Jones a life-altering path to expungement. There are thousands of folks in a similar situation, according to figures cited by the American Civil Liberties Union. Last week Tierney launched a petition at Change.org to broaden the state’s expungement process, using her story as an example. As of Sunday 3,900 people had signed it — including Middletown’s deputy mayor, Tony Fiore.

“This is not just about Nikki and it’s not just about me,” Jones said. “There are a whole lot of good people who are being held hostage because of their past. That’s not who we are anymore.”

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'It hurts our entire family'

Nikki Tierney’s problem started with a sports injury. As a teen in the 1980s, long before society understood the danger of opioids, she was prescribed painkillers and got hooked. It led her down a path of alcohol and drug dependency that she compartmentalized for a while, through earning a degree from Rutgers Law School and passing the bar.

Eventually the addiction took over. She lost custody of her four children in 2006. On Sept. 21, 2007, during a supervised visit at the beach with her youngest — 4-year-old Kole — Tierney was drunk and wandered into the water, where she had to be rescued.

She was arrested and charged with felony child endangerment. Facing seven years in prison, she pleaded guilty, signed disbarment papers and was admitted to Drug Court — a rigorous rehabilitation system from which she graduated in 2011.

“There was no thought of expungements back then,” Tierney said. “I took the deal, went to Drug Court and it wound up saving my life.”

In 2008 she earned custody of her children, whom she has raised to an exemplary degree. The oldest are triplets. Amanda Devaney is a student at Texas Christian University, which she attends on academic scholarship and is studying to be a social worker. Kyle Devaney studies business and plays football at Kean University. Ashley goes to Brookdale Community College.

Kole, technically the victim of his mother’s crime, is a sophomore at Middletown High School North and is co-enrolled in vocational school. After years of transient living — like Linda Jones, Nikki couldn’t get decent housing because of her record — they settled into a house in the Belford section of Middletown that was purchased by Nikki’s parents John and Ginny Tierney, who died in 2014 and 2015, respectively.

The house was a huge gift. Finding work proved harder. Tierney earned a real estate license and holds two jobs: She is a real estate sales agent for Gloria Nilson & Co. and a title insurance producer at Trident Title. Her income largely is commission-based, but it helps keep the family just above water. All four of her kids hold jobs as well.

“My mom made mistakes obviously; she’s paid for them,” daughter Amanda said. “People change. Not giving her a second chance, that doesn’t just hurt her. It hurts our entire family.”

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People in her corner

Matt Harris, a presidentially appointed U.S. Marshal who knows Tierney personally and professionally, wrote a letter to Gov. Phil Murphy on her behalf.

“She didn’t ask me to do it for her,” Harris told the Asbury Park Press. "Knowing where she came from, and what she’s done to shed that scarlet letter, I did it of my own volition. Why is she being treated the same way a sex offender would be treated?”

When their mutual alma mater, Mater Dei, nearly closed for financial reasons in 2015, Harris said Tierney was “front and center” in the successful fight for its survival.

“I work in this field,” Harris said. “I see people who can’t be rehabilitated, who can’t be reformed. She has completely turned her life around.”

There are others in Tierney’s corner.

Here is Ken Pecoraro, director of addiction services at CPC Behavioral Healthcare, who counseled Tierney for several years: “I’ve been doing this for over 25 years and she’s a special person. She is more than legit. For her to have a lifetime ban (on expungement), it’s misguided justice. I’m sure the law’s intentions are good, but if we’re going to look at addiction as a disease, people get better. She’s gotten better, and she can help other people (as a counselor). It’s crazy not to let her.”

Here is Tahj Holden, who coached Ranney School’s boys basketball team to the New Jersey state championship last winter: “She’s a great person and from what I’ve seen, a great parent. Her kids love her unconditionally. She had this setback in her past and didn’t let it define her. I know what she did wasn’t right, but I don’t think it’s fair that she’s still getting judged on that.”

Here is Derrick Scenna, an attorney who is Tierney’s boss at Trident: “What she’s done with her life is amazing. We don’t like our views challenged, and Nikki’s story challenges peoples’ views (about felony offenders). I’ve been fortunate enough where I’m in a position that I could help her out. I’m hoping someone will hear her story who is in a more powerful position.”

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A bill that could help

Who could help Tierney out? She tried the courts, challenging the wording of the law that denies expungement to those convicted of non-physical, non-sexual child endangerment. In ruling against her last fall, state Superior Court Judge Honora O’Brien Kilgallen told her, according to court transcripts, “Unfortunately as I indicated, I have no choice but to deny this petition for an expungement. And as I said, I do most genuinely welcome this to be taken up to the Appellate Division.”

Earlier this month, the Appellate Court also rejected her argument. She could attempt to appeal to the state Supreme Court.

She also could be granted clemency by Gov. Murphy.

But legal experts contacted for this story believe her best route, one that also would help 5,000 or so other Garden State residents who have graduated from Drug Court but have not been granted expungements, is through the criminal justice reform bill S-3662.

Part of the bill would remove language in the current law that lumps Tierney's offense with murders and sex crimes, thus barring her from an expungement. If the proposed legislation passes as is, it will open the door to a long-awaited fresh start. But there are concerns that, as the bill winds its way through the political process, it could get revised and leave Tierney on the sidelines.

It's a helpless feeling, counting on the whims of Trenton. In the meantime, Tierney will continue toward her goal of becoming a counselor and hope the roadblocks get lifted.

In a way, she is counseling already. After getting Linda Jones an apartment, Tierney sat down with Jones and helped her fill out expungement paperwork (Jones’ application will be addressed at a Dec. 19 court hearing).

And then Nikki Tierney, who the law deems unfit to help others in distress, who is barely eking out a living, whose two daughters will be sleeping in the same bed during winter break because one of them donated all of her bedroom furniture to Jones, did one more favor for a person she met just last month.

She paid Jones’ $75 application fee.

To sign Nikki Tierney’s petition at Change.org, search for “Nicole Tierney" or visit this link.

Jerry Carino is news columnist for the Asbury Park Press, focusing on the Jersey Shore’s interesting people, inspiring stories and pressing issues. Contact him at jcarino@gannettnj.com.