Four New Jersey police officers were criminally charged Thursday over a June car chase that ended in a fiery car crash and those officers kicking and dragging a burning bystander.
Prosecutors said a grand jury returned charges, including aggravated assault and official misconduct, against Jersey City police Lt. Keith Ludwig and officers M.D. Khan, Eric Kosinski and Francisco Rodriguez. Khan and Kosinski also are charged with attempted murder.
The charges stem from a June 4 nighttime incident in Jersey City, New Jersey, during which the officers were chasing driver Leo Pinkston. Multiple shots were fired during the course of Pinkston’s pursuit, with the chase ultimately ending when Pinkston crashed into Miguel Feliz’s car, NBC 4 New York reported.
Jersey City, New Jersey police officer MB Khan (pictured in 2016) is among four New Jersey officers who face criminal charges including aggravated assault after kicking and dragging on fire bystander Miguel Feliz following a June car chase that ended in flames
That crash set off a fire that engulfed Feliz’s vehicle. Feliz, 28, had not been involved in Pinkston’s chase until that moment.
A video shot that night captured Feliz exiting his car with his clothes on fire. He was then seen rolling on the ground in an effort to douse the flames, before being surrounded by officers with their weapons drawn. Officers then kicked him and dragged him to the curb.
Bystander Miguel Feliz was captured on video being kicked and dragged by police officers after he and his car caught fire during a car chase that he had not been involved in
hospitalized with severe burns and broken ribs.
The four officers were suspended without pay following the indictments, the city said.
‘As we stated at the outset, the actions taken that night required serious investigation. We took immediate and appropriate action and will now abide the judicial process,’ Jersey City mayor Steven Fulop said.
‘Our internal investigation will now begin into all the actions or inactions of department members that night. We want the community to continue to have full confidence in the Jersey City Police Department and its officers.’
It wasn’t immediately known if the officers had attorneys to comment on their behalf, but a police union official previously said the officers tried to help Feliz by putting out the flames and pulling him to safety.
Jersey City Public Safety Director James Shea said in June that Ludwig, a 24-year veteran of the force, has an ‘excellent’ record, and that the four officers, one of whom has been on the force for a year, ‘are average police officers.’
In the June video, an on fire Feliz can be seen escaping from the wreck of his car, rolling on the ground in an attempt to douse the flames as cops then surround him with their guns drawn
A police officer kicks Feliz while he is still on the ground after having escaped his burning car
The video also captured another police officer appearing to stomp on Feliz
Officers are then seen dragging Feliz across the sidewalk pavement and to the curb
Shea said at least 20 officers were involved in some aspect of the response to the high-speed chase, which lasted for several miles. Several protocols were violated, he said, including the length of the chase, firing shots at a moving vehicle and placing a car as a roadblock without approval from a supervisor.
Ludwig ‘was the supervisor of the officers who started the chase, he was involved from the beginning and he allowed it to go on long after the point where, under the attorney general’s guidelines, he should have called it off,’ Shea said.
Pinkston, 48, was charged in August with eluding police and aggravated assault while eluding.