On an early May morning in 2009, after the State Police had searched through the night trying to find two burglary suspects in Warren County, they stopped a car James Bayliss, then 21, was riding in and asked him to step outside so he could be searched.
What happened next was captured by a dashboard video camera inside a State Police patrol car. The recording, which never before has been made public, was recently obtained by
The Star-Ledger.
It shows Bayliss standing against the car as Staff Sgt. Richard Wambold Jr. frisks him. A few seconds later, after what appears to be a slight movement, the video shows Wambold throw Bayliss to the ground, kneel and punch him several times in the face.
An eyewitness in a nearby home said in a sworn deposition that she watched from her window as two troopers, later identified as Wambold and Trooper Keith Juckett, then dragged a limp, handcuffed Bayliss toward a parked patrol car and rammed his head against a tire.
She said the troopers' actions "disgusted" her.
What's more, Bayliss is not an average young man. A car accident in 2005 left him with a permanent mental disability, and his friend driving the car that morning, Timothy Snyder, told the State Police troopers on the scene about his condition before he was beaten.
On Friday, after being told
The Star-Ledger was planning to publish this story and make the video public on nj.com, the State Police announced for the first time that two troopers involved in the incident used unreasonable force.
