State-local effort to track and aid released parolees

Friday, December 26, 2008
By CHARLES HACK
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

The state Parole Board and Jersey City cops are joining forces to fight crime and keep parolees on the straight and narrow.

The state Parole Board signed an agreement Tuesday with the Jersey City Police Department to help each other track paroled prisoners when they are released into the community.

Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy and Peter J. Barnes Jr., chairman of the New Jersey State Parole Board, signed the agreement to share resources and information at a ceremony Tuesday at the City Hall Council Chambers on Grove Street.

"We here in Jersey City will know when certain dangerous offenders - usually predators - are released and about to get out," Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy.

"We are confident that this new partnership will add even greater strength to the Jersey City Police Department's ability to monitor parolees who are re-entering society."

Liaison officers in both departments will share information such as photos, terms of release and address information on parolees getting out each month. The state Parole Office in Jersey City supervises around 500 parolees at any given time.

Police officers will be able to tip off parole officers if they see former prisoners violating their paroles and both agencies will conduct joint law-enforcement operations, such as knocking on doors to make sure parolees are complying with curfew agreements.

Director Thomas James, of the state Division of Parole, and Jersey City Police Department Chief Thomas J. Comey, who also attended the ceremony, said that part of the agreement will allow parolees to get support services they need to help them from reoffending.

"Our goal is to be proactive and make it easier for these individuals to live up their terms of parole," Comey said.

Officials said the agreement makes sharing resources much more efficient, even though some officers and state parole officers already cooperate on an individual basis.