Nearly one year later, the family of Felix DeJesus is still searching for answers. The 41-year-old Paterson man remains missing. He vanished Feb. 2 shortly after being detained and then released at a park by police. The last trace of his whereabouts is in a four-minute-long police body-camera video released to the public.
The body camera footage from the arresting officers is incomplete. The footage starts with DeJesus on the ground in handcuffs, with no sound. The microphone is then turned on, and DeJesus can be heard telling police his hand was broken. The footage cuts off while he’s still in custody, before police released him into Westside Park in Paterson.
“Taking into consideration those factors, that he was intoxicated and making a disturbance, he should have been dropped off at the hospital. So the police officers exercised poor judgment,” said Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh. “But we’ve taken action, we’ve disciplined those officers. However, I can assure we’re still trying to find Felix DeJesus.” Now his loved ones want state and federal law enforcement departments to take on the case.
