The New Jersey city is often praised as a national model for modern policing, but the aftermath of the shooting of Raheem Bryant complicates the story.
By the time the car began to slow, the officer already had his gun drawn.
On August 31, 2017, 20-year-old Raheem Bryant saw a convertible idling near a gas station in Newark, New Jersey. He jumped in and drove off. The car was quickly reported stolen, and the police began a pursuit.
Most of the responding officers followed department protocol: keep a safe distance, avoid escalation and wait for the vehicle to stop. Bryant wasn’t armed, and he wasn’t posing an immediate threat. The plan was to wait him out.
But as the car came to a stop near a residential block, off-duty officer Xavier Pimentel ran up to the vehicle. He wasn’t assigned to the call. He approached the driver’s side and fired a single shot into the car, striking Bryant in the neck.
The bullet severed Bryant’s spine and left him permanently paralyzed.
A grand jury later declined to file charges against Pimentel. Bryant has since filed a civil lawsuit against the city and the police department.
The shooting occurred during a turning point for Newark. Three years earlier, a U.S. Department of Justice investigation found that the Newark Police Department routinely engaged in unconstitutional stops, searches and use of force, all of which disproportionately impacted Black Newark residents. At the same time, the city was still one of the most dangerous in the country. A federal consent decree followed in 2016. It was designed to overhaul the department’s policies and practices to restore public trust and ensure constitutional, accountable policing.
Today, Newark is often held up as a national model for police reform. Since entering the federal consent decree, the city has shifted its policing strategies toward more community-based approaches, strengthened oversight and seen a steady (though not uninterrupted) decline in violent crime. By the summer of 2020 — when protests over unlawful police violence turned chaotic in cities across the country — Newark stood out for its restraint. Demonstrations remained peaceful, and the city recorded zero police shootings that year.
But during that same period, Raheem Bryant’s case remained unresolved.
“[The city has] been trying to get the case dismissed on qualified immunity,” said Jarrett Adams, a civil rights attorney representing Bryant. “The consent decree specifically said officers should be trained not to shoot at fleeing suspects who pose no danger.”
According to Adams, Pimentel was never given that training.
The case is still tied up in appeals, while Bryant continues to battle serious medical complications stemming from the shooting. “The city of Newark is waiting on this man to die,” Adams said.
Bryant’s case didn’t make many headlines, but it lingers in Newark as a quiet reminder of how difficult lasting reform can be. Nearly a decade after the city launched sweeping changes aimed at building trust, many residents and organizers say the same frustrations continue. Traffic stops still spark tension. Complaints still go unanswered. For those who lived through the department’s worst years, the distance between policy and practice doesn’t feel nearly as wide as it looks on paper.
By the summer of 2020, Newark stood out for its restraint: Demonstrations remained peaceful, and the city recorded zero police shootings that year.
“Law enforcement has to be accountable to the communities they serve, and that still hasn’t happened,” said Aqeela Sherrils, founder of the Newark Community Street Team, a grassroots violence intervention program he led from 2014 to 2019. “They still believe they have more authority than the people who pay them to provide a service. It’s a cultural shift that still needs to take place.”
The mayor’s office and the police department did not respond to multiple requests for comment, but activists and residents point to persistent signs of mistreatment. There are stories of officers unjustly stopping Black residents, behaving aggressively during routine interactions, and using unnecessary force during arrests.
Department data support some of those concerns. In 2024, Black residents in Newark were stopped by police at more than twice the rate of white residents. And of all recorded use-of-force incidents last year, 76% involved Black individuals. While officials often argue that these numbers reflect where crime is concentrated, critics say those explanations overlook longstanding issues of over-policing.
A 2023 Fairleigh Dickinson University poll found that public confidence remains fragile. Just 10% of residents rated police performance in their neighborhoods as “excellent,” and fewer than half said they’d likely report a crime to the police.
Trust in the police also varied sharply by race and geography, according to the poll. Black and Hispanic residents were far less likely than white or Asian residents to say they felt safe or that officers treated people equally. And while many agreed that Newark had improved as a place to live, a majority, particularly in the South and West wards, believed that crime victims often have to seek justice of their own.
“We know our communities have been overpoliced. We understand that the war on drugs disproportionately impacted our spaces, and the residuals of that will take a while to overcome,” said Will Simpson, a Newark native and former director of Community Safety & Justice at Equal Justice USA.
Part of Newark’s response to that history has been the creation of more collaborative, data-informed strategies for public safety. Alejandro Santana leads one of those efforts as the executive director of the Newark Public Safety Collaborative, an initiative housed within the Rutgers-Newark School of Criminal Justice. His group collaborates with the Mayor’s Office, the Department of Public Safety and a network of community partners to reduce harm and violence through data sharing, trust-building and strategic intervention.
The shooting of Bryant and the broader mistrust it represents is a reminder that reform is not a fixed destination.
Santana says Newark has made meaningful progress in recent years, especially when it comes to building trust through community feedback sessions, expanding the role of social workers and supporting community-led approaches to public safety like the city’s Office of Violence Prevention.
“From my point of view, we’ve never had an issue with the police not being at the table or being collaborative,” he said, noting that more than 50 organizations now work in concert on public safety strategies across the city.
Still, he acknowledges that many residents continue to raise concerns about how officers interact with the public, adding that those voices need to be part of the conversation. “There are people who still have legitimate concerns that have to do with policing, and they need to be heard,” he said.
The shooting of Bryant and the broader mistrust it represents is a reminder that reform is not a fixed destination. It’s an ongoing process, one that requires constant attention from city leaders, law enforcement and the communities they serve, even after progress has been made.
There’s another reason progress is especially fragile. Earlier this year, federal funding cuts to community violence intervention programs threatened the very partnerships that helped reshape the city’s public safety model. Many of the impacted organizations have played key roles in bridging the gap between police and residents.
“I think the biggest hurdle we’re facing is the federal cuts,” Santana said. “This will continue to impact the system over the next few years, and it’s really going to put the system itself to the test.”
As Newark pushes forward with its reform agenda, Adams is still hoping for some justice for Bryant, even if there’s no sign it’s coming. “They’ve changed the culture and deserve credit for that,” Adams said, but he wonders what the lack of accountability in this case says “about their progress.”