The officers involved in a 2024 police pursuit in East Orange that led to the death of a man driving a stolen car will not be criminally charged, a grand jury decided Monday.
The decision comes following an investigation by the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office, which probes any incident where a person dies during an encounter with police.
At 10:57 a.m. on July 23, 2024, a woman was robbed of her purse while leaving an Acme in Montclair, according to a statement from the office. A few minutes later, a woman was pushed to the ground and robbed of her purse while exiting a CVS in Bloomfield.
In both instances, the suspects fled in a Nissan Sentra and witnesses reported the vehicle’s license plate number to authorities, officials said. Detectives determined that the car had been reported stolen out of Montclair the day before the robberies.
At 12:57 p.m., Bloomfield Police Deputy Chief Anthony Sisco located the Nissan in Newark, and officers from the department tried to pull the vehicle over, but the driver did not stop, the office said.
Bloomfield Police Sgt. Raymond Diaz, Lt. Michael Moleski, and Det. James Romano pursued the car into Bloomfield and ultimately to East Orange, where the pursued vehicle crashed into a car and then careened into two other vehicles, including a parked ambulance, investigators said.
The pursuit lasted about four minutes and spanned just under 3 miles, investigators said.
The driver police were pursuing, identified last month as Omar Williams, 43, of Hamilton, died from injuries he suffered in the crash, the office said.
Video released by the office shows police breaking the side windows of the car, finding him unconscious and pulling his body from the vehicle.
Those in the vehicles struck by Williams suffered non-life-threatening injuries and the police vehicles involved in the pursuit were not directly involved in the crashes, investigators said.
State law requires the Attorney General’s Office to investigate the death of a person who is killed during an encounter with police. The actions of the officers are then reviewed and include interviews of witnesses, collection of forensic evidence, review of video footage, and autopsy results from the medical examiner.
The findings of the investigation are then presented to a grand jury to determine if the evidence supports the return of an indictment against the officer or officers involved. In this case, the jury decided that the officers would not be criminally charged.
