N.J. cop stopped at ATM, pizzeria instead of investigating murder

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FRANKLIN TOWNSHIP, N.J. — A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not respond quickly or properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double homicide, instead stopping at an ATM and a pizzeria.

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Franklin County Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was on duty the evening of Aug. 1 when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screams in Pittstown, about 60 miles (96 kilometers) from Manhattan in central New Jersey, according to Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robson's office.

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But instead of responding immediately, prosecutors say GPS data and surveillance video show Bollaro drove nearly two miles in the opposite direction of the caller's location to a bank ATM.

They said dispatchers relayed other calls from concerned neighbors as Bollaro drove toward their locations without turning on his police car's hazard lights and sirens.

When he arrived at the location of the first caller, the officer told the dispatcher that he had not heard anything and said he would continue to the locations of the remaining callers. However, Robeson's office said GPS data shows he never visited the area before asking dispatch to remove him from the scene.

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They say Bollaro instead headed to Duke's Pizzeria in Pittstown, where he stayed for nearly an hour. Witnesses later saw him park and enter another local restaurant, where he remained for about an hour, prosecutors said.

Bollaro later filed a report in which prosecutors allege he made false statements about the scope of his investigation. They note that while he allegedly was canvassing the area, the officer was already on his way to the pizzeria.

The next day, Aug. 2, the bodies of Lauren Semanczyk, 33, and Tyler Webb, 29, were found in a home about 600 feet (183 meters) from the site of the first 911 call. Prosecutors say the two were shot by New Jersey State Police Lt. Ricardo Santos, who later committed suicide.

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Bollaro was charged with official misconduct for knowingly refraining from performing his police duties, prosecutors said. He is also charged with tampering with public records for knowingly making false entries in the incident report.

Bollaro is scheduled to appear in court on November 5.

His lawyer, Charles Sciarra, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment Saturday but called the charges “unfortunate” in a statement to the New York Post. He argued that “nothing Kevin Bollaro did or did not do that day affected or could have stopped” the murders.

Meanwhile, families of the two shooting victims said they are “shocked by Sergeant Bollaro's egregious behavior” and believe it is “the tip of the iceberg among numerous failures by local and state police” in the killings, WABC-TV reported.

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