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Authorities didn’t say whether they’d determined why Julius Filep was walking on the highway when he was struck in front of the AAA Insurance center on the northbound highway in East Brunswick shortly after 3:30 a.m. Sunday.
An officer was on duty and in uniform as he headed north to a crash in the highway’s southbound lanes when the police cruiser struck Filep, Acting New Jersey Attorney General Andrew J. Bruck said.
He was pronounced dead at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital at 4:13 a.m., the attorney general said.
State law and his own guidelines require Bruck's office to investigate deaths that occur “during an encounter with a law enforcement officer acting in the officer’s official capacity or while the decedent is in custody," he said.
The guidelines guarantee that the investigation is done “in a full, impartial and transparent manner."
Once the investigation is complete, the results will be presented to a grand jury -- ordinarily consisting of 16 to 23 citizens -- that will determine whether or not criminal charges are in order.
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