WILLIAMSPORT, PA — A Trump administration official on Friday accused federal judges in New Jersey of causing a constitutional crisis by rejecting President Donald Trump’s pick for U.S. attorney for New Jersey and ordering her top deputy to assume the post.

That was an “atypical decision,” said attorney Henry C. Whitaker, who went on to blast the judges for not “collaborating” with Trump officials to ensure the top federal prosecutor job would go to someone both the administration and courts agree on.

“The district court initiated this constitutional confrontation that did not need to happen,” said Whitaker, counselor to Attorney General Pamela Bondi.

Whitaker’s comments came toward the end of four hours of tedious arguments at the Herman T. Schneebeli Federal Building, where U.S. District Judge Matthew Brann joked he was tapped to take the case “for my sins.” The issue before Brann was whether acting U.S. Attorney Alina Habba has the authority to prosecute cases — given the ongoing tug-of-war over her job — as well as whether Trump and Bondi overstepped their authority in overriding the judges who refused to extend Habba’s tumultuous tenure.

Whitaker’s pronouncement irked Gerald Krovatin, one of the attorneys seeking dismissals of their clients’ criminal cases over questions about Habba’s authority.

Krovatin angrily objected and countered that Trump caused a constitutional crisis by “appointing someone who has no business being U.S. attorney of New Jersey or anywhere else.”

The court showdown came nearly five months after Trump appointed Habba, his former personal attorney, as interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey. The Senate did not confirm her within the 120-day window that federal law requires for presidential appointments, prompting a panel of federal judges from New Jersey to intervene.

In such scenarios, federal judges are authorized by law to extend an acting U.S. attorney’s tenure or name a replacement. During Trump’s first term, they were driven to act after the Senate failed in 2018 to confirm Craig Carpenito, who then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions had appointed acting U.S. attorney for New Jersey. The judges unanimously appointed Carpenito 112 days into his tenure.

But on July 22, a panel of federal judges facing a similar decision instead named Habba’s top deputy, Desiree Leigh Grace, to the post. That so enraged Trump administration officials that they fired Grace and reinstalled Habba, kicking off the ongoing legal battle that drew a small army of attorneys to this Lycoming County city best known as the home of the Little League World Series.

Brann said he expects to rule on the matter by Wednesday or Thursday, giving both sides until 5 p.m. Monday to file any supplemental briefs. He agreed to expedite the case, pointing to the disruptions it’s caused in federal courts in New Jersey.

“Are criminal prosecutions happening?” Brann asked.

“Not the way they normally would,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Coyne conceded.

Some judges have refused to arraign indicted defendants, adjourned trials, and transferred cases to other jurisdictions, said Whitaker and Coyne.

Brann urged Whitaker and Coyne to persuade Habba to recuse herself from cases while challenges to her authority remain unresolved.

“Boy, that’s confusing to everybody,” the judge said. “It’s confusing to me.”

But Whitaker said recusal is unnecessary because Bondi’s office is “fully empowered to supervise the office.”

Coyne objected to any pressure for recusal, citing a “dignity component” — although it wasn’t clear whether he meant the recusal would offend the dignity of Habba, Trump, or someone else.

“Ms. Habba is the person the president wishes to lead the office of the U.S. attorney for New Jersey,” Whitaker said.

Earlier, attorneys spent several hours debating a dizzying array of court precedents, federal statutes, and even the verb tenses of language in various laws to make their case. Brann blitzed the attorneys with questions so dense he often stopped to ask: “Do you understand my question?” and quipped, when silence met one such query: “Maybe I don’t understand this. Which is entirely possible.”

Arguments centered on two federal laws governing executive-branch appointments that require Senate confirmation.

Attorneys challenging Habba’s reappointment insist it’s unconstitutional under the Preserving United States Attorney Independence Act, the 2007 law that contains the 120-day timeline and tasks federal judges with acting if that clock runs out without Senate action. Several Congress members who voted in favor of that act filed a brief this week exhorting Brann to respect the constitutionally mandated separation of powers that law was meant to codify.

But the attorneys fighting to keep Habba in the post said her reappointment should stand because it’s valid under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, a 1998 law that directs a vacant position’s second-in-command to become the acting officer-in-charge for up to 210 days. After Trump officials fired Grace, Habba resigned and Bondi named Habba first assistant U.S. attorney, essentially restoring her as acting U.S. attorney.

“There’s little dispute that the president has the authority to remove even a district court appointee,” Whitaker said.

Still, Krovatin warned that the executive branch wasn’t meant to make successive appointments, under several federal laws.

Attorney Thomas Mirigliano, who represents an Irvington man challenging Habba’s authority, called the Trump administration’s use of the Federal Vacancies Reform Act “an end run around” the Preserving United States Attorney Independence Act.

“The president terminated the first assistant in order to backfill the role. Ms. Habba resigned to fill it herself. It’s circular,” Mirigliano said.

Attorney James Pearce, representing the Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey, cited “larger anti-circumvention, manipulation concerns” that such maneuvering raises under the Constitution’s appointments clause. That clause differentiates between principal officers, who are appointed by the president and require Senate confirmation, and “inferior officers,” who don’t require Congressional approval.

Brann told the attorneys he expected neither side would like his ruling and said his exhaustive questioning would help “tee up” the case for a likely appeal before U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals judges.

He also warned that New Jersey’s federal judges likely will have to learn to get along with Habba.

“It’s very likely that Ms. Habba is going to be the U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey,” Brann said.

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

The Trump administration has terminated five federal contracts in New Jersey that funded law enforcement work to fight opioid addiction, violence, and hate and bias incidents, cuts that Attorney General Matt Platkin blasted Wednesday as reckless and dangerous.

The Department of Justice notified state officials of the cuts by email Tuesday and ordered the state to pay back all unspent and unobligated balances or face unspecified “enforcement actions.” The contracts, combined, are worth nearly $13.1 million, but Platkin’s office couldn’t immediately say how much remains unspent and must be returned.

Platkin railed against the cuts during a Wednesday media briefing and vowed “to pursue all options,” although he did not specify what that might be.

“There was no warning. We were not consulted on how this would impact ongoing law enforcement efforts in New Jersey. These are current grants in place. We have never seen this before,” Platkin said. “This is not a way to run government. This is not a way to promote public safety.”

The notices said the funding was cut because it “no longer effectuates Department priorities.”

“The Department has changed its priorities with respect to discretionary grant funding to focus on, among other things, more directly supporting certain law enforcement operations, combatting violent crime, protecting American children, and supporting American victims of trafficking and sexual assault, and better coordinating law enforcement efforts at all levels of government,” the notices say.

Three of the contracts terminated, totaling just over $3 million, supported efforts to prevent and reduce hate and bias incidents in New Jersey. The largest pot of funding, nearly $2 million, was allocated under the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd Hate Crimes Program, which helps police and prosecutors do outreach and investigate and prosecute hate crimes motivated by the victim’s race, color, religion, gender, or other protected characteristic.

Also cut was No Hate in the Garden State, an education campaign Platkin’s office launched in September, and the Community Peacemakers Collaborative, a statewide community mediation program that trains people how to respond to bias incidents.

The cuts come as hate and bias incidents have risen in recent years, with 2,706 reported last year and 644 reported for the first three months of this year, state police data shows.

The feds also axed a $4 million grant that supported violence intervention and prevention work and $6 million allocated under the federal Comprehensive Opioid Abuse Program, which helps public officials develop diversionary programs to keep drug offenders out of prison and help them recover from addiction.

Such programs are life-saving law enforcement, “not woke liberalism,” Platkin said, adding that they’ve helped drive down violent crime and drug overdoses.

“To say, ‘We’re going to cut programs that protect people from bias, that help people with opioid addiction, that keep guns off our streets’ — it’s irresponsible, it’s reckless, it’s dangerous, and it’s going to get people killed,” Platkin said.

He added: “I hope the attorney general, Elon Musk if he’s involved in this, the president of the United States, starts thinking about the impacts that their decisions that are being made for political purposes have on the ground and affect people’s lives in communities that I am in every single day, that they don’t come to. And if they want to cut law enforcement programs that affect my state, I damn well want to be called, at a minimum.”’

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

Eight Republicans are angling to become New Jersey’s next governor, with most taking their campaign cues from President-elect Donald Trump’s performance at the polls in November.

Trump lost New Jersey, but just barely, and he did so well that some Republicans hope New Jersey has tiptoed into swing-state territory. That has driven most of those hoping to win June’s GOP primary to fight over “who’s most MAGA,” with the lone exception being Sen. Jon Bramnick, an anti-Trump moderate, said Jeanette Hoffman, a Republican strategist.

“We already know what message they’re relying on, and it’s Trump. It’s a MAGA message,” Hoffman said. “There was a huge enthusiasm in the Republican base for President Trump in November.”

That campaign message could change next year as voters see what Trump does on illegal immigration, tariffs, foreign leaders, and more, and much depends on what Trump’s approval ratings look like, she conceded. But the GOP gubernatorial candidates have several other things going for them, Hoffman said.

They’ve increasingly embraced early voting and vote-by-mail, she said. And while Democrats still outnumber Republicans by about 900,000 statewide, GOP voter registrations in New Jersey climbed by about 180,000 during the Biden administration, compared to a Democratic gain over the same period of only about 5,500 voters, state data shows.

With the county line largely defeated, it’s harder to predict who will win, Hoffman said. Without the power of the party bosses carrying them, candidates will have to rely more on money and campaigning to persuade voters, she added.

Gov. Phil Murphy, first elected in 2017 and reelected to a second term four years later, is barred from seeking a third consecutive term next year. Here are the Republicans who have declared their candidacies to succeed him:

Bramnick, 71, an attorney and sometime stand-up comedian, has served in the state Senate since 2022, after 18 years of service in the Assembly and seven years on Plainfield City Council.

Ciattarelli, 63, a businessman, served in the state Assembly from 2011 to 2018, and has served on Raritan’s borough council and as a Somerset County commissioner. He lost the 2021 governor’s race to Murphy.

Ed Durr, 61, a truck driver, is a former state senator who pulled off a stunning political upset in 2021 when he unseated then-Sen. Steve Sweeney. Durr lost his bid for a second term to Democrat John Burzichelli.

Spadea, 55, has a morning talk show on New Jersey 101.5 and previously hosted a news show on Fox.

Roger Bacon, 76, a Navy veteran who founded the Warren County Minutemen, a group that advocates for the Bill of Rights. He’s a perennial candidate who has run unsuccessfully in at least 10 state and federal races since 1992.

Robert Canfield, 33, a real estate broker and a firearms instructor.James Fazzone, 70, a former two-term Burlington City mayor and retired public school teacher, principal, superintendent, and coach. He lost a bid for state Senate last year.

Hans Herberg, 37, who ran unsuccessfully for state Assembly in 2021, works in sales and customer service, with previous positions in media and tech repair.

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

Federal authorities arrived in New Jersey Friday to investigate if the nighttime lights reported across the state since mid-November are drones on mysterious, malevolent missions or just aircraft mistaken by a panicked public as drones, Gov. Phil Murphy said Monday.

The governor, talking to reporters at the Statehouse in Trenton, said he pressed the Biden administration to send drone experts to investigate — and so far, they have found nothing alarming. Authorities do not believe public safety is at risk, he added.

“First of all, I’d say, calm down. There’s no evidence of anything nefarious here,” he said.

He added: “We never say never, but … take a breath.”

Murphy declined to detail exactly what the feds were doing to investigate, saying only there now are three “very sophisticated systems” that “come with really sophisticated individuals” scrutinizing the skies to determine what’s happening.

The systems have a range of up to 15 miles and will hopscotch around the state until investigators have answers. Sunday night, they set up in two locations — at the state police headquarters in West Trenton and at Naval Weapons Station Earle in Colts Neck — and the governor and several FBI investigators joined them to observe, Murphy said.

While countless citizens have reported drone sightings, federal investigators “are not seeing much, if any, of that right now,” he said.

He acknowledged the uncertainty is unnerving. But he also took aim at elected officials who he said should be “calming influences” instead of fueling fears with speculation and conspiracy theories.

“There is zero evidence, with all due respect, that somebody’s hiding the pea here, that the federal government or our military or somebody knows what’s going on here, and they’re not admitting to it. I see zero evidence of that,” he said. “There’s a lot of conspiracy theories out there right now. Let’s put that one with the Iranians off to the side.”

U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-02) last week blamed drone sightings on an Iranian “mothership” off the coast before walking that claim back on Friday (the Defense Department denied his allegation).

Murphy attributed some reports of drones to harmless hobbyists, noting that drones are affordable, legal, and permitted to fly at night, while others are people misidentifying airplanes, helicopters, and other manned aircraft as drones.

There also are more eyes on the sky, which likely has inflated drone reports, he added.

“You also have the phenomenon of … 18 to 19 million eyeballs looking up at the sky every night,” Murphy said. “So there’s a volume question, in terms of just pure observations. I’m doing it myself. We take the dog out. The other night, I’m looking up, and I’m trying to figure out, is it a star? Is it an aircraft? What is that? So I get it.”

He resisted labeling the public’s drone concerns as mass hysteria, saying: “It implies that people are completely hearing footsteps and there’s nothing there. But I do think there is a huge mismatch right now between the noise and the reality.”

Still, residents in other states, including Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut, have increasingly been reporting drone activity, too, he noted. Drone activity also has been documented near airports and military sites, critical infrastructure, and President-elect Donald Trump’s home in Somerset County.

So the drone mania is “a wake-up call” signaling the need for federal and state policymakers to tighten oversight over drones, he said. He called on federal authorities to pass legislation now before Congress that would give the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice more authority over drones.

“We need a better act as it relates to drones and drone incursions as a country,” Murphy said. “It is extraordinary to me that a nation as great as ours and as powerful as ours has the deficiencies that we have now seen, in living color, as it relates to drone incursions.”

Several state and federal lawmakers have criticized authorities’ response to the drone drama, saying the thousands of people who reported drones can’t all be wrong.

Assemblyman Brian Bergen (R-Morris) said focusing on passing legislation is the “exact wrong answer,” he added.

“We need to figure out where these things are coming from right now. Like all of the governor’s resources, all of his manpower, everything should be dedicated to figure out why are they there, and what’s going on right now. If you rush to policy, you’re going to come up with policy that is rushed,” he said.

Bergen was an Apache helicopter pilot in the military who served a year in Iraq. Investigating the source of the drones should not be a huge challenge, he added.

“All you got to do is follow one — one! — back to wherever the hell it’s going and figure out what’s going on,” he said.

Assemblyman Christopher DePhillips (R-Bergen) echoed calls for a federal probe, saying the feds have authority over New Jersey’s airspace and the drones could pose a national security threat. He introduced a resolution Monday urging such action.

“The federal government must take decisive action and communicate their findings quickly and clearly to prevent those with nefarious motives from causing harm and copycat hobbyists from adding to the chaos in our skies,” DePhillips said.

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

The American Civil Liberties Union is urging state and local officials to enact a “firewall” of laws and policies to protect citizens against civil rights abuses they expect will unfold over President-elect Donald Trump’s second term.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, ACLU leaders said states and cities should be ready for Trump to implement Project 2025, the controversial policy wish list circulating among conservatives that Trump has distanced himself from even as he has filled his administration with many of its key players.

“During the first Trump administration, we learned that collective power among state and local officials was critical in blunting some of the worst abuses,” said Deirdre Schifeling, chief political and advocacy officer of the national ACLU. “From city leaders who fought to make their city safe from federal deportation raids to state attorneys general who took legal actions on a range of issues, resistance was national and widespread, and it also worked, which is why Project 2025 tries to limit the power of states and increase executive overreach. We will resist that.”

Schifeling outlined a multi-year plan, dubbed “Firewall for Freedom,” that calls for state and local leaders to act in five ways:

• Protect private information. The ACLU urges state and local leaders to fight federal efforts to access sensitive data like health information and location data, which the feds could use to go after people seeking abortions, immigrants, protesters, political opponents, communities of color, and more.
• Prepare communities for mass deportations, including strategizing on how to respond to immigration raids, setting up a hotline, and providing free legal help. Policymakers should establish legal assistance funds, pardon processes, and policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities, they said.
• Fund abortion care and travel. After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the right to abortion in 2022, so many states have banned or restricted the procedure that some people have to travel long distances to get one.
• Protect children, including transgender kids and children of undocumented parents. State legislators, education officials, school board members, and more should safeguard student data, stop collecting information that could be weaponized, and enact school policies that protect against discrimination and harassment, they said.
• Keep the military out of law enforcement. Trump has warned he would use federal troops to suppress protests or aid in mass deportation. State governors and legislators should bar state National Guard units from participating in such activities, ACLU officials said.

Schifeling pointed to sanctuary state policies in place around the country, including in New Jersey, as a successful example of the type of action the ACLU envisions.

“Our message to state and local leaders is simple. Just say no. Just say no to Trump’s radical agenda and requests from the Trump administration to use state and local resources to violate our rights,” Schifeling said.

In New Jersey, where Democrats control the Statehouse and governor’s office, policymakers have adopted, or at least introduced, policies in line with what the ACLU supports.

State legislators banned immigrant detention centers in a 2021 law that remains somewhat in limbo because of an ongoing court challenge. Gov. Phil Murphy declared New Jersey a sanctuary state for transgender and nonbinary people. Lawmakers codified the right to abortion and have advanced other measures to protect or expand abortion access, including requiring insurers to cover the procedure, protecting patient data, and creating funds to support clinic security, training, and care.

Still, New Jersey is one of the most diverse states, with more than 2 million immigrants, including about a half-million who are undocumented, noted Amol Sinha, who heads the ACLU-NJ. That’s why state legislators must act on several stalled bills that would further heighten protections for immigrants and communities of color, he said.

“This isn’t about simply playing defense. We have to play offense too,” Sinha said.

State legislators should remove barriers to voting by passing measures that would prohibit voter suppression and by expanding language assistance for voters, Sinha said. They also should act to pass the Immigrant Trust Act, which would protect the privacy rights of immigrants “so that we’re not unnecessarily handing over information to those who want to cause our communities harm,” Sinha said.

“There are a lot of leaders out there that have said, ‘Well, let’s just kind of take a look at what he actually does before we take any action.’ We already know what he’s going to do based on his first term and all the rhetoric on the campaign trail and what we’ve seen from his cabinet picks,” Sinha said. “We can’t be complicit in the cruelty of the next administration and we must be aggressive in defending and expanding rights for all.”

ACLU leaders from Minnesota and Washington joined Wednesday’s press briefing, too, exhorting leaders in their states to build firewalls against Trump’s plans.

ACLU-Minnesota executive director Deepinder Mayell said his group urged Gov. Tim Walz to schedule a special legislative session to pass policies to support vulnerable populations. Protecting immigrants and health and personal data are his group’s priorities, Mayell said.

“We are asking our state leaders to lead in the face of these devastating threats,” he said.

The ACLU leaders conceded that the resistance they urge could carry consequences. Trump’s incoming “border czar,” Tom Homan, threatened to jail Denver Mayor Mike Johnston over his plans to block the administration’s mass deportation efforts.

Naureen Shah, the ACLU’s deputy director of government affairs, said she regards such threats as “saber-rattling.” Whatever the consequences, she added, they’re part of a “culture of fear” Trump and his supporters have deliberately crafted.

“But no one’s feeling the fear more than those in our affected communities — immigrant families who have been here for decades (and) transgender children,” Shah said. “We are hearing from our communities about a growing sense of fear and apprehension, and that’s why it is so important right now for leaders to lead. Our state leaders need to lead at this moment.”

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

The owner and operators of a South Jersey nursing home pocketed millions of dollars in Medicaid money while its 110 residents lived in a dirty, understaffed facility, a scheme that went unnoticed for years by the state agencies tasked with oversight, the state Comptroller’s Office has found.

Acting state Comptroller Kevin D. Walsh said Thursday that his Medicaid fraud team first began looking into South Jersey Extended Care, a for-profit nursing home in Bridgeton, because it was the state’s worst, having received more one-star ratings than any of New Jersey’s roughly 350 nursing homes.

They soon uncovered evidence of “a massive scam, perpetrated for years,” Walsh said.

Investigators found that Michael Konig — who had been barred from operating nursing homes in Connecticut and Massachusetts because of serious violations — and his brother-in-law Steven Krausman ran the home, while its supposed owner, Konig’s cousin Mordechay “Mark” Weisz, was just a straw owner.

They discovered that the home took in $35.6 million in Medicaid funds from April 2018 to March 2023, but paid $38.9 million over that period to health care management businesses Konig and Krausman owned or controlled. The duo charged the home inflated prices while essentially acting as both customer and vendor — an arrangement that “ensured that the customer never complained,” investigators wrote in their report.

State and federal laws require nursing homes, as a way to avoid self-dealing and fraud, to disclose transactions with vendors that are related parties and cap related-party costs at actual cost or fair market value, whichever is lower. Konig and Krausman did neither, Walsh said.

“These individuals were able to amass a fortune by pretending to be independent parties. In reality, they operated as one unit, providing terrible care to the sick, the elderly, and the poor, so they could make big profits.” Walsh said in a statement.

Konig’s Broadway Health Care Management took in $10 million over two years to provide nursing and other services to the home, according to the report. Yet investigators found the home had perpetual staff shortages and unqualified people in key positions — the director of social work wasn’t a licensed social worker, while the director of nursing was a licensed practical nurse whose license had been suspended after her arrest on charges of forging prescriptions.

The home often failed to meet minimum health and safety standards required by Medicaid, investigators found. Inspection reports documented filthy conditions, late medications, and residents’ medical needs that went unmet.

The three men drove the home to the brink of bankruptcy, draining it of cash, investigators found.

The problems went beyond Bridgeton. Konig and Krausman contracted with nine other New Jersey nursing homes — in Trenton, Union, Manahawkin, Perth Amboy, Teaneck, Cape May Court House, Toms River, and Maple Shade — and charged them inflated prices too, profiting $45.5 million in the process, investigators found.

Geriscript Supplies, which Konig controlled, was contracted to provide medical supplies to all 10 nursing homes. But the company spent just $3.6 million on medical supplies — and meanwhile it paid $6 million on consulting and management fees to another Konig business and $800,000 to a religious charity Konig controlled, the report says.

Krausman and Konig’s businesses received $253 million from the 10 nursing homes over the five years investigators examined — 76% of the total Medicaid funds the homes received, investigators found.

Their scheme went unchecked even though the men racked up penalties in other probes, according to the report:

A federal judge ordered a staffing agency owned by Konig to pay $636,000 in back wages after the U.S. Department of Labor found it failed to pay overtime to at least 150 workers at 10 nursing homes in New Jersey.The Federal Trade Commission determined an internet company owned by Konig, Krausman, and a third person lied to consumers about rebates. The commission barred the trio from similar schemes and they agreed to pay the FTC $600,000.In the mid-1990s, officials in Massachusetts and Connecticut barred Konig from owning nursing homes after learning of alleged sexual and physical abuse of residents and other severe deficiencies at facilities he owned or operated in those states.

Konig lost a building he owned after he racked up more than 9,000 housing code violations in Brooklyn and filed for bankruptcy, according to the New York Daily News, which called him the “landlord from hell.”Walsh said his office, with the approval of the state attorney general’s office, suspended the three men, the nursing home in Bridgeton, Sterling Manor Nursing Center in Maple Shade (which Weisz also owns), and 11 others from New Jersey’s Medicaid program and is coordinating with state agencies to ensure residents get care.

“These notices of suspension to South Jersey Extended Care and Sterling Manor Nursing Center and 11 other related individuals and entities will allow the State to take necessary steps to address the problems, and most importantly, protect the nursing home residents and get them the care they need,” Attorney General Matt Platkin said in a statement.

Walsh said he also might try to recover overpayments and seek civil fines and administrative sanctions.

The New Jersey Monitor couldn’t reach the men for comment. But their attorneys told the Comptroller’s Office that the men were not related parties, the Bridgeton home now has a two-star rating, and their profits “were within acceptable profit margins.” They accused the office of failing to understand licensing requirements, financial documents, and applicable laws.

They also offered hundreds of pages of exhibits, “many of which undercut their own arguments, were internally inconsistent, or differed in significant ways from documents previously provided to OSC and other state and federal oversight bodies,” according to the report.

“OSC stands by its findings,” the report says.

Walsh made several recommendations to legislators, as well as the departments of health and human services, to tighten oversight of nursing homes.

This is the second time Walsh has sounded the alarm on New Jersey’s worst nursing homes. He issued a report in March 2023 that identified Weisz and Krausman as the owners or operators of several of the state’s lowest-rated nursing homes.

Walsh’s investigation remains ongoing, he added.

“Our report lays bare in great detail how unscrupulous nursing home operators are able to exploit weaknesses in the system and fleece the Medicaid program,” Walsh said. “We owe it to nursing home residents, and taxpayers, to take this moment seriously, to learn from this investigation, and to ensure this can’t happen again.”

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com.

A state corrections officer has pleaded guilty to beating a man at a Woodbridge sex offender treatment facility — an attack his family described as “a gang-style assault” in a wrongful death lawsuit they later filed against the state.

Giuseppe Mandara, 55, of Brick, pleaded guilty Tuesday to aggravated assault for attacking Darrell Smith, 50, who died of a stroke five days after the Aug. 23, 2019, incident in a housing unit at the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center. The beating occurred after Smith took peanut butter, bananas, and sugar leftover from breakfast out of the kitchen, where he worked, according to the family’s lawsuit and Mandara’s attorney, Stuart Alterman.

Mandara agreed to give up his job under a plea agreement, according to the state Attorney General’s Office.

The agreement also bars him from any future public office or employment. Mandara was a correctional officer for 20 years, Alterman said. State payroll records show his annual salary reached $106,577 this year, although he hasn’t gotten a salary since last year because he was suspended without pay in July 2023.

Mandara faced up to 10 years in prison when a state grand jury indicted him in June 2023. Then, he was charged with second-degree official misconduct for abandoning his keys and radio and using excessive or unlawful force, a crime that carries a mandatory minimum of five years in prison and up to $150,000 in fines. The grand jury declined to indict Mandara on homicide charges.

The Attorney General’s Office said Wednesday that prosecutors will recommend a four-year prison sentence.

But Alterman said he instead expects Mandara will get probation because the plea agreement includes “a presumption of non-incarceration,” which is typically reserved for first-time offenders convicted of third- and fourth-degree crimes. Sentencing is set for Jan. 31.

Alterman said Mandara was a longtime officer who otherwise had a “flawless record.”

“He engaged in a fight with the inmate and perhaps was overzealous when engaging in the fight,” Alterman said. “The evidence does not demonstrate that he did anything more than strike the inmate, and the precipitant behavior was, in fact, the inmate using his position in the kitchen to commandeer materials which are normally known and used for making alcoholic beverages, or hooch, as they call it.”

Smith’s family did not respond to a request for comment.

But last year, they told the New Jersey Monitor that Mandara was one of multiple officers who taunted Smith with homophobic slurs and then jumped him in two separate attacks over one weekend, kicking, punching, slamming, and stomping him until he was unresponsive and catatonic. The officers dragged Smith to an area that was a blind spot for the facility’s surveillance cameras, the relatives said.

After the first assault, prison staff put him in solitary confinement and withheld medical treatment from him for so long that by the time they took him to a hospital, he was brain dead, his relatives said.

Their lawsuit remains ongoing.

Smith was incarcerated in the prison’s special treatment unit, where residents who have served their criminal sentences remain locked up under civil commitment because they’re considered to be not ready for reentry.

Drew Skinner, executive director of the public integrity and accountability office overseen by the attorney general, said the guilty plea shows that the state won’t ignore or condone abuses of people in state custody.

“The defendant violated the trusted position he held and will be held accountable,” Skinner said.

New Jersey Monitor is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. New Jersey Monitor maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Terrence T. McDonald for questions: info@newjerseymonitor.com. Follow New Jersey Monitor on Facebook and X.

The record is in: Nadine Menendez is a bad, or maybe unlucky, driver.

The wife of indicted Sen. Bob Menendez racked up 10 points for driving infractions in New Jersey since 2005, according to driving records the New Jersey Monitor obtained through the state Open Public Records Act.

While bad drivers statewide might wonder what’s the big deal, Menendez was at the wheel in December 2018 when she hit a pedestrian and killed him in Bogota (she was not charged). And federal prosecutors say the new Mercedes-Benz convertible she got in April 2019 to replace the car she wrecked by hitting Richard Koop was part of a massive corruption scheme that prompted authorities to indict her, her husband, and others identified as their bribers.

Her driving record shows that she was cited for using a hand-held phone while driving in September 2021, maintenance of lamps in 2016, speeding twice on the same day in 2010, improper passing in 2007, and failure to observe a traffic control device in 2005.

The citations earned her 10 points on her driver’s record. If you get six points within three years in New Jersey, you get fined, and 12 points in the same period gets your license suspended.

The record also shows she took several defensive driving courses to get the 10 points stricken from her record.

It references the Dec. 12, 2018, crash that killed Koop, but no points were levied in that incident.

Menendez’s attorney, Danny Onorato, couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

The crash and the controversy surrounding it — she left the scene without police ticketing or testing her for intoxication — drove a state lawmaker to introduce legislation in the last legislative session to require breath or blood tests in vehicle crashes involving pedestrians. It didn’t pass, but the bill’s sponsor, Assemblywoman Nancy Muñoz (R-Union), reintroduced the bill last month for the new session.

Nadine Menendez racked up six driving citations since 2005, her driver’s record shows. Menendez, whose husband is Sen. Bob Menendez, was at the wheel of a fatal crash in 2018 and her replacement car was a gift for illegal favors, federal authorities said in her 2023 indictment.

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