Paterson police radio recordings shed new light on aborted pursuit after fatal shooting
PATERSON — The sound of gunshots burst over the police dispatch system even before patrol Officer Dashawn Hinton could say anything on his radio call.
“Shots fired, shots fired,” Hinton said over the radio when the shooting stopped.
Then the officer reported the crime location, gave a description of the burgundy Hyundai that carried the suspects, and read off the vehicle’s license plate number — all as he turned on his siren and gave chase to the getaway car.
Hinton was what some cops call “in the wrong place at the right time” on the night of Oct. 1 — within sight distance as four men with guns hopped out of a stolen car and fired their weapons toward people standing outside the Question Mark Bar at the corner of Van Houten and Cianci streets.
Mary Taylor, 22, was the only person hit by the bullets. She was wounded in the head and died the next morning. None of the shooters have been arrested. Hinton chased the suspects for about 1.5 miles, an 80-second pursuit that ended when he was told to stop by the lieutenant supervising the patrol division that night.
Paterson Press last week obtained copies of the city Police Department’s radio transmissions from the time of the shootings, audio recordings that shed new light on the aborted law enforcement pursuit. That chase took place 10 days after Paterson police Officer in Charge Isa Abbassi issued a memo on car chases imposing new standards that are more restrictive than state guidelines.
What do the tapes say?
About a minute into the pursuit, Lt. Matthew VanDerVelden asked Hinton about his speed during the pursuit.
“I observed them do it and they ran into the vehicle,” Hinton responded. “Now they’re headed, we’re passing The Brownstone,” Hinton added, referring to the banquet hall.
“Speed?” VanDerVelden repeated.
“I’m going 60 right now,” Hinton said, his siren blaring in the background. “They have their lights off.”
“All right, call it off,” VanDerVelden told Hinton.
'Complex' decision to end pursuit stirs ire
Taylor’s parents have condemned the Paterson Police Department, saying the chase should not have been stopped.
"They made the wrong call, and they don't want to be held accountable," Taylor’s mother, Crystal Woolridge, said in an interview in October. "That officer was close enough to see the license plates. That's damn close. How could you let them get away? They wasn't shooting at you."
The Police Department on Wednesday did not provide a response to a reporter’s questions about the pursuit recordings. In October, the department issued a statement saying the decision to terminate a pursuit is “complex.”
"In making that decision, supervisors take into account many factors, including risk to the public, risk to the officers, as well as environmental factors,” the department’s spokesperson said.
Under Abbassi’s new guidelines, Paterson police supervisors were told in late September that pursuits should be stopped unless there’s “an imminent threat to the community.”
Mason Maher, president of the union that represents Paterson’s superior officers, defended VanDerVelden’s decision to have Hinton stop pursing the shooting suspects. Maher said the lieutenant would have been blasted if the chase continued and the fleeing suspects crashed and hurt someone.
“These are the tough decisions superior officers have to make every day in a split second,” Maher said, noting that the new policy may have played a part in VanDerVelden’s judgment call.
“I believe he made a decision based on the information he had at the time that was based on protecting the safety of the community,” Maher added. “You can’t fault Lieutenant VanDerVelden for that.”
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What don't we know?
What’s not clear from the audio recordings is whether VanDerVelden knew that Taylor had been shot in the head by the suspects. He referred to the crime as a “shots-fired incident,” and Hinton did not say in his radio calls that someone had been hit by the gunfire.
It’s not even clear from Hinton’s written report and his radio calls whether he knew that Taylor was hit as he chased the suspects. In his written report, Hinton described the actions of the shooters and his efforts to pursue them. But he did not say that he saw anyone struck by the gunfire. In Paterson, it’s somewhat commonplace for people to fire guns without their bullets hitting anyone.
A security camera video of the incident showed that Hinton was on Van Houten when the shootings happened at a distance that may have limited what he could see. Hinton immediately began pursuing the shooting suspects in the Hyundai down Cianci Street without stopping to check on the people outside the bar.
On the police radio transmissions, the first time anyone mentioned there was a victim in the shooting came about 50 seconds after VanDerVelden told Hinton to call off the pursuit. That information came from an officer at the scene on Van Houten. After that, there’s a steady stream of radio transmissions focusing on which way the suspects were heading when the chase ended.
About six minutes after VanDerVelden told Hinton to call it off, someone on the police radio said an officer with the Passaic County Sheriff's Office found the Hyundai from the shooting scene abandoned on North Seventh Street, with a door open and no one inside.
Casings from fired bullets were found inside the car, said a Paterson officer who checked the Hyundai.
Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press. Email: editor@patersonpress.com
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Paterson NJ: Police radio sheds light on pursuit after fatal shooting
