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Five uniformed Hillsborough officers responding to a request for a welfare check went to the Piedmont Path home where Patrick Chin, 43, and his new bride lived at 4:10 p.m. Sept. 28, Acting Attorney General Andrew J. Bruck said.
"When the officers arrived, they encountered Mr. Chin inside the home holding an approximately three-foot long sword," Bruck said.
"During the encounter, Officer George Kokinakous fired his service weapon, fatally wounding Mr. Chin," the attorney general said.
Officer Robert Feriello also pepper-sprayed him, Bruck said.
Officers and emergency medical workers rendered first aid before Chin was taken Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where he was pronounced dead at 5:28 p.m., the attorney general said.
A son of Tawainese immigrants, Chin was raised in Voorhees and received a Bachelor of Science degree from Rutgers University’s Cook College in 2000, according to his obituary.
He worked in IT for Merck out of college before becoming an IT business process analyst for Bristol Myers Squibb. Last year, the company promoted him to IT business partner.
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 are presented to a grand jury -- ordinarily consisting of 16 to 23 citizens -- that determines whether or not criminal charges are in order.
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