Five Civilians Honored By Lawrence Police, Council

In addition to formally recognizing , members of the township council during their meeting on May 17 teamed up with the township police department to recognize and honor five members of the community for actions they took during the past year to help others.

(Audio of the awards ceremony can be listened to from the box at the right.)

Each of the five was presented a police department “Civilian Award” by township Police Chief Daniel Posluszny and a proclamation from council presented by Mayor Greg Puliti.

“This is one of the best things I enjoy doing as police chief, when we give out awards each year in May,” Posluszny said at the start of the brief awards ceremony. “It’s one of the greatest things to be able to do – thank the civilians and people in the community for helping us do our jobs. Because without the community, we can’t do our jobs. It’s not just the police. We’re all in this together.”

The honorees included:

• Robert Juarez, a resident of Quakerbridge Road, who on April 4 of this year spotted an 11-year-old boy who had run away from his home on Mendrey Court in Lawrence Square Village because he had received “a bad report card.” Recognizing that the boy was upset, Juarez invited him into his home to play soccer with his children and immediately called police, who had been out searching for the boy. The boy was then reunited with his distraught mother.
• Thomas Kmiec and his father, Joseph Kmiec, residents of Charles Way, who during the early-morning hours of Dec. 18, 2010, helped police . After spotting the burglary in progress, the Kmiecs quickly phoned police and provided responding officers with detailed descriptions of the individuals and their getaway car. The suspects were stopped minutes later and arrested by police. The items they had allegedly stolen from the neighbor’s vehicle were recovered.
• Justin Rufolo and Justin Wiegmann, both of Montgomery Township, who helped pull an elderly woman from a car that began smoking after it crashed into a tree along Route 206 last June. They were driving along when they came upon the accident. Once they got her safely away from the car, they comforted the woman until police and emergency services arrived.