TENAFLY—A Tenafly resident and former Port Authority of New York and New Jersey commissioner resigned from her position with the bistate agency after video of her interaction with borough police during a March 31 traffic stop involving her daughter and three friends on Route 9W in Tenafly was released, prompting agency officials to describe the incident as “profoundly disturbing conduct.”
Caren Z. Turner, a former Port Authority commissioner—who served as chair of the agency’s governance and ethics committee—and Democratic lobbyist from Tenafly, apparently flashed her badge to the Tenafly police officers on scene, after they told vehicle occupants the car would be impounded because it was not registered.
News coverage of Turner’s resignation last Monday and release of the police car’s dashcam video April 24 has propelled the story to widespread coverage and international viral video fame.
On a Tenafly police dashcam video that went viral after release on April 24, Turner is seen arriving on scene, at times demanding information, badgering and berating the officers to provide her details on the stop, and dropping names of local officials, including the mayor and police department officials.
‘Shut the f… up’
Minutes after arriving on scene and after numerous attempts to question the officers, Turner is told to move to the side of the road for her own safety.
After being told by one officer she could take her daughter, she waves her finger at officers saying: “You may not tell me when to take my child. You may shut the [expletive deleted] up and not tell me when I may take my child, and her friends, who are Ph.D. students at MIT and Yale. You may tell me nothing,” she says on the video.
The vehicle was stopped for front-tinted windows and an obscured out-of-state rear license plate. While the driver produced a valid license, the driver could not provide the vehicle’s insurance card or registration, and the car was impounded by police.
After the Tenafly police officers explained the situation to the car’s driver and occupants, officers said they were all free to leave the scene by means of other transportation.
Turner’s daughter called her mother—Caren Z. Turner—for a ride home from the scene and when Turner arrived, she immediately started questioning the officers.
At one point, Turner demands to know why the officers stopped the car and she is told that the stop doesn’t concern her since all passengers are adults and she should ask the driver why he was stopped.
In the video, she appears agitated and demands “I need to know” to the officers.
Over the next minutes, the police car’s video shows Turner flashing her gold commissioner’s badge, identifying herself as a Port Authority commissioner, demanding to be called “commissioner” and not “miss,” oddly mentioning the passengers were graduate students of Ivy League colleges, threatening to go over the officers’ heads to the “police commissioner,” berating the officers, and threatening to contact Mayor Peter Rustin.
‘Not a nice person’
After Officer Matthew Savitsky provides his badge number, 540, and name, to Turner, she remarks: “I’ve got all your information, sweetheart,” and drops the name of another Tenafly police dispatcher. She then adds: “You’re an ass…you’re not a nice person,” to Savitsky.
Following her demand to know where the car will be impounded, Officer Savitsky informs Turner that the car’s driver and her daughter were informed where the car will be impounded. Savitsky tells Turner her “daughter was very nice as well. She asked and I told her.”
‘I’m not so nice…’
“Guess what? I’m not so nice. And you can tell that to everybody. And it’s fine,” Turner adds.
A moment later, she looks toward Savitsky and observes he has “a smug-ass look on your face…and it seems to please you,” referring to the car being impounded.
Officers’ report
The two Tenafly police officers, Matthew Savitsky and Tom Casper, were waiting for the car to be towed from 9W to an impound lot when Caren Turner showed up. In his report, Savitsky wrote shortly after her arrival “she then began a line of questioning in a demanding nature. She demanded to be informed what is going on and why they [vehicle occupants] were stopped.”
“Based on her demeanor, the tone of voice, the ways she was presenting herself and the way she was attempting to misappropriately use her professional position to gain authority in this situation, I advised her to speak with the driver of the vehicle for more information,” wrote Savitsky.
Savitsky’s report further notes that after the car was towed and he returned to headquarters, he noticed Turner speaking with a police dispatcher and a lieutenant at headquarters.
The car’s driver, John Rula, 32, was issued three motor vehicle summonses with a court date set for May 2, 5 p.m., in Tenafly Municipal Court. Summonses were for an unclear plate, failure to exhibit a current insurance card, and an unregistered motor vehicle. His address was redacted from the police report.
Police chief responds
“My officers did a phenomenal job,” said Chief Robert Chamberlain on April 25.
He said he notified Port Authority of the situation immediately after reviewing the incident report and dashcam video.
Savitsky, an officer for six-plus years who made the vehicle stop and Casper, an officer for about 18 months, arrived on the scene to assist, can both be seen throughout the entire video-recorded interaction with Turner.
He said “the whole borough has been inundated” with emails, phone calls, and praise for the officers’ professionalism involved in the incident.
“It’s all been very heartfelt and nice to receive the praise,” said Chamberlain, who noted the department has received much positive media coverage regarding the officers’ professional restraint and conduct.
“What’s interesting is I’ve already heard from dozens of people in other states that they want to use that video as part of their officer training,” said Chamberlain.
“I believe their professionalism is representative of this entire department. This appears to me to be the standard in this department,” he added.
As for Turner’s behavior during the incident, Chamberlain expressed sympathy for her.
“It’s unfortunate that it had to happen and play out the way it did,” he said.
“I feel bad for her. It’s a great reflection on my department and it’s not a great reflection on her,” said Chamberlain.
‘Official misconduct charges’
Former Tenafly Councilman Mark Zinna, who served as acting mayor for most of 2017, said official misconduct charges should be brought against Turner for her “above-the-law attitude” throughout the approximately 20-minute incident recorded by police dashcam video.
Official misconduct, a crime of the second degree, carries a minimum sentence of five years in prison without parole, and a maximum of 10 years.
“That video should be used in the proper training of new officers on how to handle such behavior,” Zinna noted.
Zinna said it’s likely investigations by the Port Authority, state Attorney General’s Office, and Tenafly could lead to further charges, but he noted that Turner’s attitude and behavior during the incident “is indicative of the same institutional problems we’ve seen there for years.”
In early 2015, both Govs. Chris Christie and New York’s Andrew Cuomo vetoed a pair of bills that would have brought sweeping changes to the Port Authority—then under heavy criticism and scrutiny for its role in the “Bridgegate” scandal where bridge access lanes in Fort Lee were allegedly restricted as political payback.
‘Browbeating police officers’
“That something as simple as a traffic stop can degenerate into browbeating police officers, that somehow she [Turner] is above the law and we’ve all seen this type of behavior over the years out of Port Authority,” said Zinna reached April 25.
He cited former Port Authority Chairman David Samson’s so-called “chairman’s flight” to his vacation home in South Carolina as an example of “institutional problems” that needed to be reformed and yet continue to plague the bi-state agency.
Zinna said Turner’s behavior—he called it a “red flag for what’s going on over there”—needs to be changed. He called the authority “a poster child for institutionalized corruption in many areas, including real estate, investments, and political lobbying,” and asked, “Does the whole house need to be cleaned out?”
“That’s what really bothers me about this [Turner incident]. We keep letting corruption continue and that’s what we get, this kind of adolescent behavior,” he added.
Zinna said he was “very proud” of the way Tenafly’s police officers handled the incident.
Mayor’s name dropped
At least twice while trying to intervene in the March 31 traffic stop, Turner mentions contacting Tenafly Mayor Peter Rustin, who she calls “a friend.” Rustin confirmed that he is Turner’s friend and appeared upset with the incident.
“She went too far, obviously. She’s a very nice lady. Obviously, they [the police officers] were very restrained as you can see. The whole incident is very unfortunate,” added Rustin.
Turner: ‘Unfortunate incident…’
“Last month, my daughter and three of her friends were in a car that was pulled over by a Tenafly police officer for non-moving violations, including having tinted windows,” said Turner, in a statement. “The officers subsequently decided to impound the vehicle, leaving the four young adults on the side of a busy highway.
“Concerned, I hurried to the scene to assist them. As a parent, I was upset and uncomfortable with the unfolding events,” Turner continued. “I let my emotions get the better of me and regret my tone toward the police officers and use of off-color language. For this, I apologize.
“However, at no point did I violate the Port Authority’s Code of Ethics or ask for special treatment for anyone involved, nor did I suggest, in any way, that I would use my position at the Port Authority to affect the outcome of the violations issued to the driver,” said Turner. “My resignation from the Port Authority is a recognition that this unfortunate incident could and should have been avoided.
“As a long-time Tenafly resident, I have always taken an active role in the community, including working with law enforcement officials, and I encourage the Tenafly Police Department to review best practices with respect to tone and de-escalation, so that incidents like this do not recur,” said Turner.