SUSPICIONS SWIRL AROUND NEW JERSEY POLICE CLIQUE

ELIZABETH, N.J. -- Lt. Edward Szpond, once one of the most influential
officers in the Elizabeth Police Department, sits these days at a desk in
the department's basement, in charge of the property room. He was reassigned
to the glamorless job several years ago after the mayor of Elizabeth said he
had determined that he was one of the leaders of a secretive and disruptive
group of officers known as the Family.

The Family, long the subject of worried talk within the department, became a
public problem for the city in 1994, when a dozen officers staged a protest
over what they claimed was the secret group's influence within the
department and its intimidation of other officers. And so that year, the
department removed Lieutenant Szpond from his position in charge of the
force's day shift of officers on patrol.

But even though Lieutenant Szpond, who denied any wrongdoing, is in the
department's basement, the question of the Family -- its size and makeup and
the extent of its possible misconduct -- continues to roil the department.

There have been subsequent investigations into potential wrongdoing by the
group of officers, conducted both by the department itself and county
prosecutors; a grand jury report in 1998 said that nearly one-fifth of the
370-member force belonged to the Family. Officers on the force have
testified under oath that the group, led by Lieutenant Szpond, conducted
bizarre initiation and excommunication rituals.

Among the city's minority residents, officers believed to be members of the
Family have, rightly or not, gained a reputation for a range of misconduct,
from physical abuse to false arrests. For a department with only four
Hispanics and no blacks among its roughly 60 superior officers, the
suspicions have only deepened the divide between the police and many
residents.

Elizabeth, a North Jersey city of 110,000 that was once a blue-collar
manufacturing center, is now nearly 70 percent black and Hispanic, and many
of its former jobs have dried up. Drugs and crime are prevalent problems.

"The Family was originally formed as a study group," said Patrick Maloney,
director of the police in Elizabeth from 1995 to 1997, who said the members
had studied together for promotion exams. "It was formed as a way for its
people to get ahead. But it soon became a specialized unit within the
department that had its own insignia. I don't know if it engaged in any
illegal activities. Its biggest effect within the department was to divide
the department and damage morale."

While the existence and impact of the Family have received only brief
treatment in a local newspaper, many believe the damage done by the group of
officers has been deeper and more persistent than previously known.

In lawsuits, a criminal prosecution, a grand jury investigation and separate
internal departmental inquiries, officers believed to be members of the
Family over the years have been accused of intimidating new officers, using
racist language, trying to control promotions and overtime payments, and
planting evidence on civilians in order to manufacture drug arrests.

The various investigations have produced differing results.

* In 1995, the department, after reassigning Lieutenant Szpond (pronounced
spond), barred him from leaving his personal car, which officials said was
adorned with German Iron Crosses, on police property. Lieutenant Szpond, 62,
with 33 years on the city's force, remains furious over his reassignment,
and he denies that he was, or is, part of any secret group.

* A 1998 grand jury report concluded that roughly 70 of the department's 370
officers belonged to the Family, and said the group's members had received
preferential treatment in assignments. The report said the group's
activities were "impermissible," but it revealed no criminal conduct.

* In 1998, a black officer committed suicide and left behind a nine-page
letter claiming that he had witnessed numerous instances of other officers
planting evidence on suspects. The Union County prosecutor, Thomas V.
Manahan, said in a statement that an investigation into the officer's
accusations had concluded that "the allegations were unfounded or not able
to be substantiated by credible evidence."

* A handful of internal departmental investigations in recent years produced
sworn testimony by officers that depicts a troubled department. Officers
testified that Lieutenant Szpond regularly engaged in racist slurs, and ran
secret candle-lighted induction and excommunication rituals.

Mayor J. Christian Bollwage and the Police Department's current director
acknowledge that a group of officers known as the Family did exist and may
exist in some form today. But there is little agreement on whether the group
was a genuinely sinister collection of officers or merely a peculiar clique.

James M. Cosgrove, the current police director, said the group's influence
had been diminished or eliminated.

"There was an absence of some form of leadership in the Police Department,
and during this absence, some members reverted to an informal leadership and
formed some groups," Mr. Cosgrove said. "Hopefully, this group is not with
us anymore."

But interviews with a dozen current or recently retired officers as well as
with church and neighborhood leaders suggest that the Family still exists.

The Rev. Michael Granzen, the minister at the Second Presbyterian Church in
Elizabeth, said that for years, he heard that the department was plagued by
a group of bad, racially insensitive officers known as the Family.

"There is an institutional racism in the Police Department and the city of
Elizabeth," Mr. Granzen said. "I have worked with kids here for seven years.
Some have been beaten and others falsely arrested by the police."

Just which officers belong to the Family, or who might have belonged, is
unclear.

Mary Rabadeau, a former officer in Elizabeth who is now in charge of the New
Jersey Transit Police Department, said she once belonged to a group referred
to as the Family, but she characterized it as a study group. Two current
officers said that they belonged to the group, but insisted on anonymity.

All of the nearly dozen officers identified as Family members in sworn
testimony by officers during the department's internal investigations would
not comment.

The Inquiries Reports of Trouble, But No Prosecutions

Concern about the Family's existence first surfaced in 1994, when a number
of officers staged a sickout. Upset about what they believed was the group's
influence over the allotment of overtime and other benefits, the officers
also complained that the leaders of the group had harassed and intimidated
officers who had opposed them.

The disgruntled officers distributed fliers with about 70 names of the
officers they said belonged to the Family.

The dispute prompted a departmental investigation, but a number of officers
interviewed recently said that the inquiry had focused not on the Family,
but on who had distributed the fliers.

"The department had no interest in investigating the Family or its
activities," said Daniel Wood, a retired lieutenant.

The existence of the Family again became a matter of dispute in 1998 during
the criminal trial of an Elizabeth police officer. Officer William F. Burdge
was indicted in an assault case, accused of an unprovoked attack on a
67-year-old woman and her brother.

At trial, Officer Burdge claimed that he had attacked the woman and her
brother after drugs were slipped into his drink at a local bar. The officer
claimed that the Family had been behind the prank. Officer Burdge was
convicted, but his allegations prompted a grand jury report.

The April 1998 report confirmed the existence of the Family. It said that
roughly 20 percent of the force belonged to it, and that the group had tried
to run much of the department's business.

The report said that the activities of the group were "most disturbing," and
that they did not "further the legitimate goals of law enforcement."

In response, Mayor Bollwage said that although he was concerned about the
report, he had seen no evidence of serious wrongdoing.

But others were skeptical of the limited findings.

"This was all about self-promotion at the expense of the city of Elizabeth
and the Police Department," Daniel John Sargent, a retired sergeant, said of
the Family. "There was a subversion of standard police practices. There was
escape from punishment if there was wrongdoing because they were members.

There was a numbers game, trying to make narcotics arrests for promotion."

Prosecutors were again forced to investigate the group after the death of
Officer Leon Thomas in late 1998.

Officer Thomas, one of the few black officers on the force, shot himself in
the head in October 1998. But Officer Thomas, according to prosecutors and
city officials, left behind a nine-page letter outlining a raft of misdeeds
by officers on the force.

Mayor Bollwage said he had read the letter, and Mr. Manahan, the county
prosecutor, said in a statement that his office had checked into the dead
officer's claims. The investigation was closed, Mr. Manahan said, because
there was insufficient evidence to warrant prosecution.

But Officer Thomas's family, as well as a number of other black officers on
the force in whom Officer Thomas had confided, remain unconvinced. Three
officers, Tracy O. Finch, Michael W. Brown Sr. and Lateef Banks, said
Officer Thomas had told them before his death that he had kept books full of
detailed notes describing a litany of false arrests and instances of
excessive force.

But Officer Thomas's sister, Tawana, said the books had been taken from her
brother's apartment after his death, and that only a single page had
survived. The page of notes describes a September 1996 arrest in which,
according to Officer Thomas, a suspect was beaten by three Family members.
The officers then planted drugs on the suspect to justify the arrest, the
notes claim.

The officers identified by Officer Thomas did not respond to requests for
comment. Mr. Cosgrove, the police director, said he had never heard of any
notebooks. Mr. Manahan's office said the prosecutor would not respond beyond
his statement about Officer Thomas's letter.

Tawana Thomas said, "The notebooks had logs detailing police wrongdoing and
discriminatory treatment by the Family since the day of Leon's hiring."

Ms. Thomas is not alone in her suspicions. A number of neighborhood leaders
and public defenders say the same names come up when they hear complaints of
police mistreatment or dubious arrests.

"There are a number of Elizabeth police officers who usually work in teams
who account for an excessive amount of very suspect drug busts," said James
Kervic, who heads the public defenders' office in Elizabeth. He said a
pattern of inconsistencies in the police reports and statements by his
clients disputing the police versions of their arrests has plagued Elizabeth
for several years.

The Lieutenant Many Complaints Focus on One Man

Much of the turmoil surrounding the existence of the Family has centered on
Lieutenant Szpond. For years, he occupied one of the department's most
influential positions, directing its day shift of officers on patrol.

Lieutenant Szpond appears to have been, at minimum, a provocative force
within the department. Mr. Maloney, the former director of the police, said
Lieutenant Szpond used to arrive at work with Iron Crosses painted on his
car until he was ordered to keep the car off department property. The
lieutenant, according to numerous current and former officers, also liked to
be referred to as "Commander," in deference to his stature within the
Family, and a sign spelling out "Commander" still hangs above his basement
desk.

After the 1994 sickout, Mayor Bollwage ordered that Lieutenant Szpond be
removed from his post directing the day shift.

"When Eddie was moved to the basement, it didn't solve the problem," Mr.
Maloney said. "But it made it much more difficult for him to recruit
people."

In an interview, Lieutenant Szpond denied any knowledge of a group called
the Family or any misconduct. "The only family I belong to is the family of
all law enforcement officers," he said. He also described his car's crosses
as "surfer's crosses."

But an examination of the sworn testimony given by officers during the
numerous internal investigations that touched on the role and nature of the
Family reveals a number of serious allegations against Lieutenant Szpond,
among them:

* Lieutenant Szpond has referred to blacks in Elizabeth in vividly offensive
ways.

* He used to refer to the department's patrol cars as his "panzer columns."

* He liked to declare in meetings that if Hitler were alive, he would have
rewarded him with an Iron Cross.

* Lieutenant Szpond used to conduct candle-lighted initiation and
excommunication ceremonies for members of the Family. In a strange twist,
the lieutenant had the new recruits swear their allegiance to him while
clutching a flag of the cartoon character Yosemite Sam.

Lieutenant Szpond, when interrogated by the department, admitted using the
offensive terms for blacks, but insisted that they were not derogatory or
that they were terms used on the city's streets, according to transcripts of
his testimony. He said the Family was nothing more than a study group,
although he admitted conducting initiation ceremonies.

Perhaps the fullest sworn account given of Lieutenant Szpond's role as the
leader of the Family was offered by Officer William C. Capraun during a 1998
internal investigation.

According to a transcript of his testimony, Officer Capraun said Lieutenant
Szpond called him about a year after he joined the force in 1985. Officer
Capraun said he later joined Lieutenant Szpond at the house of Mary
Rabadeau, the former director of the Elizabeth Police Department and now the
chief of the State Transit Police. There, he was asked to join the Family.

Officer Capraun, according to his testimony, said Lieutenant Szpond told him
with whom he could speak and associate with on the force. Years later,
Officer Capraun testified, he was "excommunicated."

"I want to go on the record," Officer Capraun testified at the hearing in
December 1998, "saying I'm a victim of extreme, bizarre behavior that went
unchecked for 12, 13 and God knows how many years, that no one put a stop to
that insane man that's in the basement right now that completely, ultimately
destroyed this department."

Chief Rabadeau said the incident recounted by Officer Capraun never
happened.

Mr. Maloney, the former police director, said senior officials had been
concerned about Lieutenant Szpond, but were unable to discipline him because
they had no evidence that he had violated any specific department policy.

"What grounds did we have for removing him?" Mr. Maloney asked. "He needed
to have done certain things wrong, to have violated rules and regulations."

The Lawsuit Sergeant Says Officers Were Protected

Sgt. John Guslavage, a veteran of 31 years on the Elizabeth police force,
has long contended that the Family protected corrupt behavior.

In 1995, Sergeant Guslavage sued the department under the state's
whistle-blower statute, claiming that the department had shut down a drug
investigation to protect members of the force, including Family members. The
City of Elizabeth, the Police Department and the individual officers
involved have all denied the allegations in court filings.

But according to the suit, Sergeant Guslavage, then a member of the
department's narcotics unit, was investigating drug sales at an Elizabeth
bar in 1994. During the investigation, the suit contends, evidence surfaced
that three narcotics officers, all members of the Family, were present at
the bar during drug deals.

But, the suit alleges, when Sergeant Guslavage reported the information to
his superiors, it was ignored and the investigation was ended.

Frustrated, Sergeant Guslavage took his information to the United States
attorney in Newark. But according to the officer, the federal prosecutors
merely turned the information over to local prosecutors.

A spokesman for the federal prosecutors in Newark, Michael Drewniak, said
their office had informed the county prosecutor's office of Sergeant
Guslavage's claim, but could not say what had become of it.

Sergeant Guslavage, however, wound up accused by his own department of
having gone "out of the chain of command" with his complaint. While no
formal finding has yet been issued by the department, the sergeant is no
longer assigned to the narcotics unit.

Sergeant Guslavage would not expand on his lawsuit's accusations, saying he
feared retaliation. A state judge will not deal with Sergeant Guslavage's
suit until the department issues its disciplinary ruling.

Sergeant Guslavage's fate, according to numerous officers interviewed for
this article, has given rise to doubts that the Family will ever be fully
investigated.

"What amazes me," said Mr. Wood, the retired lieutenant, "is that they have
gotten away with this for so many years."

That befuddlement runs deep on the streets of Elizabeth, too.

"There is a great deal of suspicion towards the police," said Hassen
Abdellah, a lawyer and former county prosecutor. "I hear frequent reports
that the police use excessive force, on occasion use the derogatory N-word
while on duty and plant drugs on suspects. This has produced widespread
feelings of fear and apprehension."

Salaam Ismial, chairman of the United Youth Council, a youth and family
advocacy group, agreed. "When you talk about police abuse, the same names
keep coming up," he said. "But nothing is ever done."

Richard Mixson said he is going to try. Mr. Mixson, a 27-year-old father of
three, said he was falsely arrested in February 1997 by two officers -- both
identified by other officers as members of the Family -- who planted drugs
on him. Mr. Cosgrove said that his officers had not planted narcotics, and
that they had observed Mr. Mixson going back and forth between a doorway and
cars in the street in what they suspected was drug activity.

Mr. Mixson, who works nights as a janitor for Merck, the pharmaceutical
company in Rahway, N.J., said he was outraged. And at the trial, he was
acquitted.

Now, he is suing, hoping to force the courts to examine the conduct of the
department's officers.

"I have many friends who can't get jobs, can't serve on juries and who have
reached a dead end because they have records they do not deserve," Mr.
Mixson said. "It is criminal what is going on here, and even with the risk
of a three-year jail term if I lost, I decided it was time someone in our
community stood up to them."