West Orange Police Department officers assured a Jewish event organizer that protesters would be kept off of synagogue property but then let them breach the grounds and pursued criminal charges against the organizer after he intervened to protect a fellow Jewish congregant, a federal lawsuit alleges.
Dr. Moshe Glick, a New Jersey dentist and volunteer emergency medical technician, filed the civil rights complaint on Nov. 10 in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey against the township of West Orange and its police department, as well as the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office.
The lawsuit alleges that Glick repeatedly told the police department prior to the Nov. 13, 2024 event at Congregation Ohr Torah, a Modern Orthodox synagogue in the township, that he feared protesters would march near the synagogue.
An Israeli real estate fair, which was originally slated to take place in Glick’s West Orange home, was moved to the synagogue. Glick’s doorbell camera recorded anti-Israel activist Tova Fry photographing his house on the day that she put a letter in his mailbox demanding that he cancel the gathering and threatening to sue, according to the complaint.
In an email cited in the complaint, Matthew Feula, who was then the police deputy chief, assured Glick that “the group will not be permitted on private property nor impede the flow of vehicular” or “pedestrian traffic and the safety of all individuals will be paramount.”
Feula, who is now chief of police, said that West Orange would assign two officers to the synagogue and that he expected that the county sheriff’s office would provide five deputies, according to the court filing. Glick alleges that he relied on those assurances when he decided not to arrange more private security.
“It is vitally important, especially in today’s environment, with violent antisemitic attacks at synagogues and elsewhere, that law enforcement and public officials provide the protection every citizen deserves,” David Schoen, Glick’s lawyer, told JNS.
“When that system breaks down, it takes courageous people like Dr. Moshe Glick to stand up and speak out,” Schoen said.
The lawyer told JNS that the suit documents “what can happen when law enforcement fails to appreciate the danger Jewish members of the community face from violent and virulently antisemitic attacks, even when they are warned of the danger in advance.” (JNS sought comment from the police department.)
“It also documents very troubling communications among public officials reflecting a bias and prejudgment that treated a hero, who jumped into action to save an innocent worshipper from attack, as if he were the criminal, despite unassailable video evidence reflecting the true set of events,” he said.
“Each and every allegation in this civil rights complaint is supported by concrete evidence,” Schoen told JNS. “What happened here to Dr. Glick should be shocking to every fair-minded American.”
The complaint alleges that police officers failed to erect barricades or stop protesters, who disregarded their instructions to stay near a nearby firehouse. It cites police body-camera footage that recorded a protester saying, “We’re not stopping.”
Solomon Radner, another lawyer for Glick, told JNS that video evidence shows “some very troubling statements by some police officers.”
The complaint cites body-camera recordings, in which Bradley Squires, then a West Orange police sergeant, who was supervising the response, told protesters that “you are intimidating me.”
“I’m gonna put this camera in the car, and then we’ll talk,” he later said.
The lawsuit alleges that Squires, who is now a lieutenant in the department, then placed his body camera in the car.
Glick alleges that police officers failed to intervene when a protester named Altaf Sharif placed synagogue congregant David Silberberg, who was then 64, in a chokehold. Glick struck Sharif with a flashlight to get him to release Silberberg, per the filing.
The complaint alleges that Squires admitted that he did not see the altercation but declared that “the doctor,” meaning Glick, would be locked up.
Vincent Torrisi, a police officer who prepared the incident report, also said on camera that he did not see what happened and that no officer had witnessed the altercation, according to the suit.
The lawsuit alleges that authorities withheld video evidence and prosecuted Glick, despite a prosecutor’s recommendation to dismiss charges. It quotes a supervisory prosecutor, who wrote that “as far as I’m concerned, there’s only one victim here, and that’s Mr. Sharif.”
Then New Jersey governor Phil Murphy pardoned Glick in January. The remaining charges were dismissed on Feb. 17.
