Jan. 06--ATLANTIC CITY -- A judge tossed out a lawsuit this morning that stemmed from a fatal carjacking last fall.
Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Julio Mendez said Atlantic City Mayor Lorenzo Langford's ban on routine patrols of casino parking garages crosses the line and interferes too greatly with daily police operations, which state law entrusts to municipal law enforcement officials. He then dismissed Langford's lawsuit against county Prosecutor Ted Housel, whom Langford sued after Housel intervened in support of Deputy Chief Ernest Jubilee's authority to determine whether police can patrol casino parking garages.
"The mayor's executive order is not one of policy, but an invasion of the chief of police's right to run the day-to-day operations ops of the department," said Mendez, who expects to issue a written opinion later today or Monday.
Attorney Robert L. Tarver, who represented the city, said he wasn't sure whether they will appeal the decision.
Langford issued an executive order banning officers from doing so on a regular basis shortly after Jubilee made public reassurances of police presence in the garages in the wake of a carjacking that claimed the life of tourist Sunil Rattu, 28, of Old Bridge, and injured his girlfriend Radha Ghetia, 24, of Sayerville.
They were walking to their car in the Trump Taj Mahal parking garage when three young men confronted them and forced them to drive to an alley off the 500 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, where they both were shot. Rattu did not survive.
Tarver argued that prior court rulings have supported municipal executives setting policy dictating where patrols can or should go, so the reverse should hold true.
Chief Assistant Prosecutor Jack Lipari, who represented Housel, argued that Langford's order hamstrings Jubilee, and is specific and rigid to the point that it is too intrusive on the daily operational decisions entrusted with law enforcement.
Copyright 2012 - The Press of Atlantic City, Pleasantville, N.J.
