Man sues New Jersey State Police for sexual assault during body search for marijuana
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By Phil Gianficaro
Columnist
When a New Jersey State Police Trooper nearly undresses a suspect during a body search for marijuana on the side of a busy Burlington County roadway, it raises a question: Why?
I don’t know if Jack Levine had recently sparked up a doobie, shared a bong, or auditioned for a bit part in a revival of the Cheech and Chong stoner classic, “Up in Smoke.”
Nor do I know for certain if Levine smelled like marijuana because he’d recently been in the company of a buddy ‘bogarting’ a joint.
What I do know is the zeal with which New Jersey State Police Trooper Joseph Drew frantically body-searched Levine for the smallest amount of pot on the side of Route 206 in Southampton 13 months ago crossed into the ridiculous and bordered on creepy.
Levine was pulled over for tailgating. Troopers Drew and Andrew Whitmore contend they detected marijuana odor on the 23-year-old Toms River resident. Levine, who was handcuffed behind his back, repeatedly denied he was holding the drug. What commenced was an intense prolonged search. On the 24-minute police dash camera and body camera videos, Trooper Drew begins searching Levine’s person. He reached into Levine’s pockets. Checked his socks. Repeatedly pulled at and peered inside the waistband of his trousers. Pulled up the suspect’s shirt and hooded sweatshirt.
Later, Drew snapped on blue latex gloves and began reaching down inside Levine’s pants, into his briefs, and around his genitals and buttocks in search of marijuana. As Drew’s hand drove deeper down the back of Levine’s pants, the suspect shouted, “He’s raping me! He’s raping me!” Drew then unsnapped the waistband of Levine’s pants and continued to search. Really, does it take that long to feel for a Ziploc bag? Drew shook Levine’s pants legs, ostensibly to free a dime bag that he hoped might slide out. Ridiculous. The trooper found nothing, just as Levine had assured him.
At one point early during the search, and as Levine continued complaining about the troopers’ reasons for the search and Drew’s hands reaching down where they didn’t belong, Drew told him, “If you think this is the worst thing I’m going to do to you, you’ve got another thing coming, my friend.”
What did Drew mean by that? Was it a veiled threat, that unless Levine complied he might be in for something worse? Because they smelled marijuana, which is, like, 20 minutes from being legal in the state? Wouldn’t it have made more sense for the troopers to take Levine to a barracks to be searched, instead of practically undressing him near a roadway where two law enforcement vehicles attracted the eyes of passing motorists? Shouldn’t our state police focus on more pressing matters than on someone who looks like he could’ve been an extra in a Wayne’s World skit on “Saturday Night Live” years ago? All this for some weed? New Jersey’s finest pulled over a long-hair with a sassy lip and treated him like he was Pablo Escobar.
And the only reason the public has seen the dash/body cam videos is because John Paff, of the New Jersey Libertarians for Transparency, stumbled upon the legal filing, filed an open public request in January, and posted the video on his website earlier this month.
Levine has filed a sexual assault lawsuit, which is weaving its way through the legal system.
This whole thing stinks, from the over-zealous body search, to a state police spokesman refusing to discuss the incident or release the department’s policy on such searches, to the troopers’ apparent violation of the state attorney general’s policy mandating such searches not be performed in public.
It’s understood law enforcement has a necessary and difficult job to do. But why did these troopers choose to take this one on to such an extreme?
Search me.
Columnist Phil Gianficaro can be reached at 215-345-3078, pgianficaro@theintell.com, and @philgianficaro on Twitter.
https://youtu.be/fbKuuLfyqXw
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