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Giuseppe "Joey: Mandara, 54, of Brick Township “abandoned his equipment, including keys and radio, and thereafter used excessive or unlawful force” on Darrell Smith at the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center in Middlesex County, the indictment says.
A grand jury in Trenton returned the indictment charging Mandara with misconduct last week, according to a statement issued by state Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin’s office on Friday, July 7.
The charges were limited to the misconduct allegation and didn’t tie Mandara to Smith’s death, the attorney general said.
It also didn’t refer to other correctional police officers who authorities said were involved.
Platkin noted that an investigation was continuing, however.
Darrell "Malik” Smith served more than 23 years in state prison on convictions for kidnapping and aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer.
He was then civilly committed to the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center in the Avenel section of Woodbridge.
Operated jointly by New Jersey’s Department of Corrections and the Department of Health and Human Services, the ADTC houses roughly 700 offenders who have been committed there — either after they’ve served prison sentences or instead of — for rape and other sexual assaults on adults and children.
In addition to a large medium-security facility, the ADTC has a 100-bed minimum security unit and a 90-bed special management unit.
The objective is to provide treatment, education and vocational studies, with the possibility of reintegrating those sent there into society at some point.
Some have their commitments renewed by judges and either die or spend dozens of years in state custody there.
Although security is high, they are referred to as “residents” and not inmates.
Smith apparently had been promoted to cook and was near the end of a shift serving meals in the kitchen when he asked another resident to bring some leftover peanut butter and bananas to his room while he cleaned up, according to a lawsuit filed by his family.
An officer allegedly stopped the resident, went into Smith’s room herself and took some things out, the lawsuit alleges.
She then accused him of being a thief, it says.
Smith reportedly told her and Mandara that they couldn’t just go into his room and take things, then was verbally assaulted by both of them, according to the lawsuit.
Smith was then pressed against a wall by Mandara, had his head slammed into a door and was tackled to the ground, it alleges.
Mandara continued to pummel him, shouting epithets, the suit says.
The female officer sounded an alarm that requires correction officers to arm themselves with riot helmets, shields, and batons to quell a disturbance.
Several officers arrived and joined in beating Smith, the lawsuit says.
Smith, who didn’t receive any medical attention, was again beaten a day or two later, it says. Left incapacitated, he was allegedly dumped in the facility’s suicide watch wing, where he involuntarily defecated and vomited on himself, the suit says.
Outside medical help was brought in a couple of days later -- nearly four days after the first incident -- and Smith was rushed to JFK University Medical Center in Edison, it says.
He was placed on a ventilator and died on Aug. 28, 2019.
State law and his own guidelines require Platkin to review 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," no matter what the circumstances are.
The guidelines guarantee that the investigation is done “in a full, impartial and transparent manner," removing politics or personal agendas, Platkin has said.
Once the investigation by Platkin’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (OPIA) is completed, the results are presented to the grand jury “in a neutral, objective manner, and with appropriate transparency,” the attorney general said.
The panel then renders a ruling on whether the incident was handled according to the attorney general's guidelines.
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