2 N.J. troopers lose jobs over high-speed escort to Atlantic City

After escorting a caravan of sports cars on the Garden State Parkway last year, two New Jersey state troopers have agreed to give up their jobs.

Sgt. Nadir Nassry, 47, pleaded guilty to tampering with records for using black tape to alter the numbers on the license plate of his police car and leading the caravan to Atlantic City.

Trooper Joseph Ventrella, 29, pleaded not guilty and could be allowed in a pretrial intervention program that would leave him without a criminal record.

Both troopers have agreed to forfeit their jobs immediately, state Attorney general Jeff Chiesa said Monday.

“They’ve both been permanently barred from law enforcement positions and Nassry has also been barred from public employment in New Jersey,” Chiesa said. “The message is simple. You cannot, as a state police officer, conduct yourself as these two troopers did.”

Prosecutors are recommending Nassry, a 26-year police veteran, get probation when he’s sentenced next month.

Chiesa said the high-speed escort created a safety issue for other motorists.“We know from their conduct that they were masking and altering their plates so that they could travel through, they thought, in a way that would go undetected,” the attorney general said. “That wasn’t the case, and I think the way we resolved the case protects New Jersey and sends the right message to the state police.”

Chiesa says he’s confident state police now have clear guidelines to prevent those high-speed escorts from happening again.