Keansburg ex-cop gets 4 years in prison for trying to have sex with unconscious woman
FREEHOLD - A former Keansburg police officer who admitted trying to have sex with an unconscious woman is heading to prison for four years and has permanently lost his job, Monmouth County Prosecutor Raymond Santiago said.
Superior Court Judge Jill G. O’Malley on Friday sentenced Nicholas Thompson to the prison term and ordered that he serve 85% of the sentence before he can be considered for release on parole, under the state’s No Early Release Act.
O’Malley also ordered that Thompson, 25, be required to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law and be subject to lifetime parole supervision once he is released from prison, Santiago said in a news release. In addition, Thompson permanently forfeited his police job and any possibility of future employment in New Jersey as a result of his pleading guilty earlier this year to second-degree attempted aggravated sexual assault.
At his plea hearing in May, Thompson admitted he attempted to have sex with a woman while she was passed out at a friend’s house after a night of partying in January 2021.
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Thompson at the time of the offense was a special law enforcement officer in Keansburg, and was later was sworn in as a full-fledged patrolman.
An affidavit of probable cause to arrest Thompson revealed the defendant, a friend and the woman went to the friend’s house on Jan. 23, 2021, after having been at a bar and house party where both Thompson and the victim had been drinking. The woman passed out on the couch and became suspicious the following morning when she found her underwear on the floor, the affidavit said.
She and the friend then watched a Ring surveillance video on which Thompson was seen walking half-naked into the room, climbing on the victim and engaging in sex with her, the affidavit said.
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“Sworn members of law enforcement are rightfully held to a higher standard of conduct, on the job and off,’’ Santiago said. “When they fall so short of that standard that their conduct becomes criminal, we then have a solemn obligation and responsibility to step in and ensure that they are held fully accountable.’’
Thompson’s defense attorney, Mitchell Ansell of the Ocean Township law firm Ansell, Grimm and Aaron, said at the time of the guilty plea that his client had “made the biggest mistake of his life.’’
Assistant Prosecutor Melanie Falco, who is director of the prosecutor’s Professional Responsibility and Bias Crime Unit, handled the case for the state.
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Kathleen Hopkins, a reporter in New Jersey since 1985, covers crime, court cases, legal issues and just about every major murder trial to hit Monmouth and Ocean counties. Contact her at khopkins@app.com.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Keansburg NJ ex-cop sent to prison for sex with unconscious woman
