The Record (Bergen County, N.J.)
North Bergen, N.J. (AP) -- A police officer kicked off the force after being acquitted in an assault case is striking back via the Internet against police and municipal officials.
For seven years, Tom Rowan’s Web site, www.NorthBergenPD.com, has accused North Bergen officials of wrongdoing, prompting several attempts to shut it down. The latest claims his site poses a threat to homeland security by broadcasting live police radio transmissions.
“My goal is to reveal misconduct within the township of North Bergen, specifically the police department and with municipal officials,” Rowan told The Record of Bergen County.
Township officials sued him last month in Superior Court in Hudson County, claiming the “unauthorized and illegal rebroadcasts interfere with local, state and federal law enforcement efforts, including those of the Department of Homeland Security, and facilitate the commission of crimes and terroristic acts.”
Nonsense, says Rowan, who notes that anyone with a scanner can hear the same thing.
North Bergen’s lawsuit also claims Rowan is misleading the public with “confusingly similar” Web site domain names that might confuse Internet users who end up at his site instead of the township’s. It also accuses him of misappropriating township logos.
It further claims Rowan is attempting to profit from his deception by offering to sell the NorthBergenPD.com and .org domain names for $325,000. He recently withdrew the sale offer.
He says visitors to his site should quickly realize it is not affiliated with the township, and says his page hardly looks like an official Web site.
On May 10, a Superior Court judge denied the township’s request for a restraining order to halt the police radio Web casts. The judge also refused to bar Rowan from operating any Web site with a domain name that might be confused with the township’s site, northbergen.org. No trial date has yet been set.
Rowan says the “Tales of Misconduct” site received more than 600,000 hits as of last year; he has since stopped counting. Now, instead of a page hit counter, the site features a clock that ticks off the days, hours, minutes and seconds to the township police chief’s mandatory retirement age.
“It’s a site run by a disgruntled former employee, and it’s just totally scurrilous,” said Herbert Klitzner, the township attorney. “It just looks to demean people, to insult.”
Police Chief Angelo “Buddy” Busacco did not respond to messages from the newspaper seeking comment.