Bloomfield Police Officers Sean Courter and Orlando Trinidad are asking a judge to set aside their guilty verdict
NEWARK -- Attorneys for two Bloomfield police officers on Friday called on a Superior Court judge to throw out the cops' conviction on official misconduct and related charges for submitting false police reports about a 2012 arrest.
As part of their motion for a judgment of acquittal, the attorneys for Sean Courter and Orlando Trinidad cited a lack of evidence needed to support the guilty verdict issued by the jury on Nov. 5 at the officers' trial.
"I believe there's just simply insufficient evidence to support all the charges," Trinidad's attorney, Frank Arleo, told Judge Michael L. Ravin during Friday's hearing.
But Essex County Assistant Prosecutor Berta Rodriguez asked the judge to deny the motion, because the state had met its burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt in regard to each element of the offenses.
"There was sufficient evidence to warrant the conviction on all the charges...because the state's proofs were sufficient for any rationale jury" to convict Courter and Trinidad, said Rodriguez, who tried the case with Assistant Prosecutor Frantzou Simon.
"The jury did find both defendants guilty of these charges based on the evidence and the testimony presented," Rodriguez added.
The judge said he would issue a written decision on the motion in the coming weeks.
Bloomfield Police Officers Sean Courter and Orlando Trinidad, pictured left to right, when their photos were taken after they were taken into custody on Nov. 5, following their conviction on official misconduct and related charges. Courter, 35, of Englishtown and Trinidad, 34, of Bloomfield, were found guilty of making false statements in police reports about the June 7, 2012 arrest of Bloomfield resident Marcus Jeter on the Garden State Parkway.
Based in large part on police dashboard videos - including footage of Jeter with his hands raised inside his vehicle - jurors determined the officers' reports falsely claimed Jeter tried to grab Courter's gun while Courter was removing Jeter from the vehicle, and that Jeter struck Trinidad.
In addition to official misconduct, the officers were convicted of conspiracy to commit official misconduct, tampering with public records, falsifying or tampering with records and false swearing.
Trinidad also had been charged with aggravated assault for striking Jeter during the incident, but the jury convicted him of the lesser offense of simple assault.
The officers are each facing a minimum of five years in state prison without parole on the official misconduct charge. Their sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 22 before Ravin.
Following the guilty verdict, Ravin revoked the officers' bails and remanded them to the Essex County Correctional Facility, where they remain in custody.
After the officers were convicted, Bloomfield Police Director Samuel DeMaio said the township police department was moving to terminate Courter and Trinidad. The officers had been suspended without pay.
Jeter - who testified during the trial that he had his "hands up" the whole time - is pursuing a lawsuit against Bloomfield, Courter, Trinidad and other defendants.
In asking the judge to approve their motion during Friday's hearing, the officers' attorneys reiterated a claim they had made during the trial - that the police reports were based on what Courter and Trinidad "reasonably believed" had occurred at the time they prepared those documents.
Arleo noted how Courter can be heard on the dashboard footage yelling about Jeter reaching for his gun, and claimed it "defies logic" that Courter would act that way if he didn't reasonably believe Jeter was trying to disarm him.
"It just defies logic," Arleo said. "It's just not the way the world works."
Courter's attorney, Charles Clark, said the main issue in the case was the officers' intent in writing their police reports and he said the state did not present evidence that would lead a "reasonable juror" to conclude their intent was to falsify those reports.
"I just don't think the evidence is there where a reasonable jury could conclude there was intent," Clark told the judge.
The series of events leading to Jeter's arrest began when Courter and Bloomfield Police Officer Albert Sutterlin responded to a domestic-related call at Jeter's township home. His girlfriend's sister called 911 after Jeter threw the girlfriend's cell phone down a staircase during a verbal dispute.
After the officers arrived, Jeter left the residence. Courter has said Jeter was drunk and fled after he had ordered him to stop, but Jeter has said he was not drunk and that Courter indicated he could leave the residence.
Courter later stopped Jeter on the Parkway, followed by Sutterlin. The officers approached Jeter's vehicle with their guns drawn and ordered him to get out. Trinidad arrived at the scene and struck the front of Jeter's car with his patrol vehicle.
After Courter received approval from a supervisor, he broke the driver's side window and removed Jeter from the vehicle.
Courter and Trinidad claimed in their police reports that Jeter tried to disarm Courter and that he struck Trinidad. Jeter was charged with eluding, attempting to disarm a police officer, resisting arrest and aggravated assault.
Marcus Jeter testifies he had his hands up when police approached his vehicle after pulling him over on the Garden State Parkway. Bloomfield police officers Sean Courter and Orlando Trinidad, are on trial charged with official misconduct and related charges in connection with their June 7, 2012 arrest of Jeter. Prosecutors allege that a police dashboard video shows Courter and Trinidad lied about the incident in police reports. Newark, NJ 10/15/15 (Robert Sciarrino | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com) When Jeter's case was still pending, prosecutors only had the dashboard video from Courter's patrol vehicle. Jeter's attorney later obtained the dashboard video from Trinidad's patrol vehicle through an open public records request made with the Bloomfield Police Department.
When prosecutors reviewed that second video, they determined the video was inconsistent with the officers' police reports. The charges against Jeter were then dropped in April 2013 and Courter and Trinidad were ultimately indicted in January 2014.
During the trial, prosecutors argued the videos showed the officers made false statements in their reports that Jeter tried to grab Courter's gun when Courter was removing him from the vehicle, and that Jeter hit Trinidad.
Clark and Arleo countered that the video from Trinidad's patrol vehicle shows Jeter's hands came down at some point when Courter was trying to remove him.
Sutterlin, who retired in May 2013, pleaded guilty in October 2013 to falsifying or tampering with records. After testifying at the officers' trial, Sutterlin was later sentenced to two years of probation.
During his trial testimony, Sutterlin said he included information in his police reports that Jeter tried to grab Courter's gun and that he struck Trinidad, even though Sutterlin had not witnessed those events. He said he received those details from Courter and Trinidad.
But Sutterlin acknowledged no one had told him to lie about the incident. Sutterlin had said he consulted with the other officers about the sequence of events, and that he believed his reports were accurate when he wrote them.
Bill Wichert may be reached at bwichert@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @BillWichertNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.