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It's been 5 days since an NJ councilmember was shot, and police are nearly silent
By
Louis C. Hochman
Published Feb 6, 2023
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Seth Wenig/AP/Shutterstock
By
Louis C. Hochman
Published Feb 6, 2023
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It’s been nearly five days since a Sayreville, New Jersey councilwoman was shot and killed in front of her home, but authorities leading the case have not provided any details since the morning after her death.
Councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour was shot and killed on Wednesday night, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office, which is leading the investigation. The prosecutor’s office acknowledged to some media it was investigating a homicide that night, and that police had found a woman shot multiple times in her car — though that information wasn’t posted to the prosecutor’s office’s Facebook page or its website until the next morning. On Thursday, it issued a press release saying Dwumfour was the victim.
Borough leaders say they haven’t been told anything more — though they stress they don’t believe there’s a threat to the community, even though the prosecutor’s office hasn’t addressed publicly whether that’s the case.
Authorities haven’t given any indication whether they suspect a motive, or have a person of interest identified. No arrest has been announced, and it’s unclear if a killer remains on the loose.
The prosecutor’s office said Friday it wasn’t planning a press conference “because the investigation is still active and ongoing we are declining to comment on all matters at this time,” and that it didn’t have any updates to offer. It hasn’t yet returned requests for comment this weekend and Monday morning.
There’s no universal playbook for how and whether to engage the public during a high-profile case, Robert Bianchi, a former Morris County prosecutor and current defense attorney, said. He said statewide media training for prosecutors would go a long way.
Yet in at least some high-profile cases, politicians and law enforcement make themselves far more available, sharing at least some details.
For instance, a day after a New York City shooting killed a mother who was pushing her baby in a stroller last June, city Councilmember Julie Menin said police had told her there was a person of interest in the case, and that it was being investigated as a domestic violence incident. Police also confirmed that to Gothamist the day following the shooting.
Just this week, when an off-duty NYPD officer was shot in the head, NYPD chief Michael Baldassano specifically told reporters he had “no reason to believe” the shooter knew the target was a police officer, even as the shooter remained at large.
Eunice Dwumfour was a 30-year old Republican councilwoman from Sayreville, and a liaison to the borough's Human Relations Commission. She was found shot dead outside her home Feb. 1, authorities say.
Nelia Rodriguez via Facebook
But law enforcement and borough officials stress every case is different.
Sayreville Borough Administrator Glenn Skarzynski, a retired member of the police force, pointed to the arrest of 28-year-old Bryan Kohberger, accused of killing four University of Idaho students. A judge in January issued a gag order, barring survivors, witnesses and victims’ family members from even talking about the case. Late last year, as the case progressed, the Moscow, Idaho police chief refused to answer questions about whether he believed the killer was still nearby.
“As it turns out, they were very good at what they did, and by keeping distractions away from the investigation or people interjecting into it, they were able to unravel an extraordinary complex case and make a very good arrest,” Skarzynski said.
In Dwumfour’s killing, he said, “we're trying to be as absolutely transparent as we can. It's just that we don't want to be the ones to make this go sideways.”
As a borough administrator, Skarzynski would not generally be privy to closely held details of a law enforcement investigation. He said the borough had “strict assurances” there was no ongoing threat to public safety — but when asked to elaborate, he said he hadn’t been told that “verbatim.”
“But I cannot imagine a scenario where the prosecutor of Middlesex County would know of any danger to the public and would not share it appropriately with the public,” he said. “I cannot even conceive that.”
Executive orders from New Jersey governors and public records law require certain information about crimes to be disclosed within 24 hours, if requested — for instance, the type of crime that’s been committed, its location and any weapon used. If an arrest has been made, authorities have to release the name, address and age of any victims, as well as that of the defendant, with some exceptions. Any charges have to be disclosed, as do certain circumstances of the arrest itself.
But the law also allows exceptions, when authorities believe disclosing information could jeopardize an individual’s safety, or the investigation.
The prosecutor’s office has said this much: Police responded to a call of gunshots shortly before 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, near a road called Samuel Circle — the area of the La Mer townhome development where Dwumfour lived.
The officers found her in her vehicle, shot multiple times. Neighbors have described hearing several shots before her car crashed into two parked vehicles. The prosecutor’s office said she was pronounced dead at the scene.
And Sayreville police via Facebook asked members of the public for any video footage they might have from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. showing the area on the night of the killing. They directed the message to residents of the La Mer complex where Dwumfour lived, or the Harbour Club on the other side of the Garden State Parkway.
They're also asking anyone who traveled Dwumfour's street, Pointe of Woods Drive, and other nearby roads (including one that runs alongside Harbour Club) if they have dashcam footage as well. But police and the prosecutor’s office haven’t otherwise said if they have reason to believe the killer was in the area of Harbour Club.
Councilmember Vincent Conti — who’d been the governing body’s public safety liaison before Dwumfour took over that role in 2022 then was reappointed to it in January — said he’s spoken to borough police and feels assured they’re doing a thorough job. “They’re turning over every stone,” he said.
Conti said he wished more answers were coming quickly for the community, but he trusts that police and the prosecutor’s office have reasons for limiting what they share. And he said he feels safe.
“I know it's frustrating for them. It's frustrating for us as well,” he said. “We think that, you know, ‘Hey, it's been a few days, we should be done with this whole thing.’ And, and, you know, it's just not as easy as that.”
The councilman, who sat next to Dwumfour during meetings, said he expects any release of information to be “carefully calculated” to avoid tipping off suspects or otherwise harming the case.
Police search inside a drainage grate near the home of Sayreville Councilmember Eunice Dwumfour in the Parlin area of the borough Thursday morning.
Seth Wenig/AP/Shutterstock
Bianchi, the former Morris County prosecutor, said it’s a “conundrum,” deciding how much information to release to the public: “You certainly don't want the bad guys to know where you are in your investigation.”
But he also cited examples of cases where the public is concerned for its safety. And he said there can be value in being available for press conferences or other engagement, even when law enforcement doesn’t think it’s prudent to say much.
If he were working on the Sayreville killing, Bianchi said, “I probably would get only to the point of saying there's no danger to the community based on our investigation” — and only if he were sure that was the case. That would be more than the Middlesex office has said to this point.
“As a prosecutor, the bottom line here is I [wouldn’t] want to give investigative information out in a case like this,” he said. “I recognize it's high profile, but I don't want the tail to wag the dog.”
Tagged
public safety
new jersey
Politics
Louis C. Hochman
After about two decades in (mostly) New Jersey-focused commercial print, digital and digital-but-radio-adjacent news, Lou stumbled into member-supported news in early 2021, as the editor and CEO of Montclair Local. There, he (hopes he) expanded enterprise, brought more sophistication to digital storytelling and moved the nonprofit newsroom closer to long-term financial sustainability. He helped lead the Local to its fourth consecutive General Excellence award from the New Jersey Press Association — the NJPA's highest honor with judges noting the paper's work to strip away layers of government opacity, to hold power to account, to make news accessible for more members of the community, to share the stories and concerns of more facets of the community and to tell compelling stories across multiple media. He's excited to continue the same ethic — news as a public service — at NYPR as the New Jersey and suburbs editor, drawing on the extraordinary talents of reporters including Karen Yi and Nancy Solomon. Lou lives in Philly (that commute!) with his partner and their two cats, about whom and about which he speaks incessantly.
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