N.J. Official Says Race Profiling Persists

Some state troopers are still practicing racial profiling on the New Jersey Turnpike despite a major reform effort, the state’s attorney general told a Senate committee Tuesday.

Atty. Gen. John J. Farmer Jr. began an internal audit of last year’s trooper activity after a January study showed blacks and Latinos were being stopped more than whites. Investigators are reviewing videotapes of every motor vehicle stop by suspected troopers, Farmer told the state Senate Judiciary Committee.

Blacks and Latinos are being searched much more than white drivers, Farmer said, even though reports show whites carry drugs more often than do minorities. Searches of minority drivers are also based on lower legal standards than the one troopers use for white drivers, Farmer said.

Troopers seized drugs or cash in 25% of their searches of whites, compared with 13% of searches of blacks and only 5% involving Latinos, officials said.

Former Atty. Gen. Peter G. Verniero, now a state Supreme Court justice, broke years of denials two years ago and acknowledged the racial profiling. Last week he testified for 13 hours and defended his actions as attorney general.

Members of the state Senate Judiciary Committee have drafted a letter to Acting Gov. Donald T. DiFrancesco asking him to seek Verniero’s resignation from the bench.