The bills, sponsored by Sen. Brian Stack, would increase punishment for crimes connected to political violence or harassment of public officials. (Hal Brown for New Jersey Monitor)
A Senate panel in unanimous votes Monday approved bills that would heighten penalties for harassment against public officials and certain politically driven crimes.
The legislation advanced by the Senate Judiciary Committee comes as public officials in New Jersey and nationwide say they are increasingly becoming targets for harassment and violence. Sen. Troy Singleton (D-Burlington) tried to deflate criticism that one of the bills would limit criticism of elected officials.
“If an individual, as we said before, goes to any public meeting like this one and says, ‘You know what, I don’t like the way Troy Singleton voted on this bill or that bill. I think Troy Singleton is corrupt,’” Singleton said. “Though that would hurt my feelings, under this bill … it would not stop that person of being critical of any action that I’m taking.”
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That bill, sponsored by Sen. Brian Stack (D-Hudson), the Senate judiciary chairman, would upgrade penalties for cyber harassment against public servants, including, among others, elected officials, jurors, and judges.
Cyber harassment aimed at a public servant could earn jail sentences of between one and five years under the bill. The state’s existing harassment law caps sentences at 18 months.
The bill would also create a new office tasked with assisting victims and creating new roadblocks for harassment aimed at public servants. Among other things, that office would be tasked with collaborating with social media platforms to develop stricter policies on the identification and removal of harassing posts.
The bipartisan legislation faced little opposition. Leonard Filipowski, who operates on YouTube under the name Leroy Truth, was critical of the bill.
“Senate bill 3470 expands cyber harassment law in a way that allows investigative reporting about public officials to be reframed as a serious criminal offense carrying state prison exposure based not on violence or threats but on who my speech and my reporting is about,” Filipowski said. “That is not public safety. That is power protecting itself.”
Filipowski is a longtime Stack opponent and has accused the senator, who is Union City’s mayor, of corruption. Stack, who has denied any wrongdoing, and other Union City officials have accused Filipowski of harassment, which Filipowski denies.
The bill makes no changes to the elements that define cyber harassment under state law.
To be found guilty of cyber harassment, a person must have threatened physical harm to another or their property, threatened to commit a crime against them, or posted or requested obscene material about a person with the intent to cause them emotional harm or fear.
It will need to clear a vote before the Senate Budget Committee before heading to the chamber’s floor. An Assembly companion has not advanced through committees in the lower chamber.
A separate bipartisan bill sponsored by Stack and Sen. Doug Steinhardt (R-Warren) would create a new political violence charge that prosecutors could add to indictments against individuals who commit serious crimes like murder, kidnapping, or sexual assault, among others, based on a victim’s political beliefs.
The construction of the political violence charge mirrors that of the state’s bias intimidation offenses, which is what New Jersey calls hate crimes.
Under both, the severity of penalties keys off the severity of the underlying offense. If someone, for example, commits a robbery in which no one is injured or killed, they face five to 10 years in prison. But if that robbery was targeted based on the victim’s political beliefs, the perpetrator could also face a first-degree political violence charge, which would carry penalties of up to 20 years’ imprisonment.
A companion bill has not been introduced in the Assembly.
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