WNYC

Cop vs. Cop

New Jersey taxpayers are footing the bill for millions of dollars worth of legal costs and settlements for lawsuits against local police officers, police departments and towns. The majority of those cases are legal spats between individual officers or officers and departments, not civilian suits.

Cop vs. Cop

New Jersey taxpayers are footing the bill for millions of dollars worth of legal costs and settlements for lawsuits against local police officers, police departments and towns. The majority of those cases are legal spats between individual officers or officers and departments, not civilian suits.

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  Prior to this story this dataset didn't exist. Producers Sally Herships and Damiano Marchetti spent a year and a half, often using OPRA, New Jersey's Open Public Records Act, to request records such as copies of settlement checks from municipal insurers and police and resolutions from town and city meetings, authorizing settlements. Legal complaints and other court records were also gathered from townships named in lawsuits and courthouses around the state. Legal databases such Pacer and New Jersey's ACMS, Automated Case Management System, were often used to locate records.

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  Sally Herships, Damiano Marchetti / Jenny Ye, Louise Ma / WNYC Data News Team. Follow us @datanews, email us here.

  The WNYC Data News Team is part of a public radio station supported by audience contributions. If you like what you see, consider supporting our work.