A July 20 deadline for establishing standard operating procedures to ``explain in detail how the state police should initiate and conduct traffic stops'' - an area of concern after the attorney general disclosed in April that some troopers had been unconstitutionally stopping and searching minority motorists - was also missed, Davis said.
The procedures ``are substantially complete at this time,'' he said Friday. ``They are being reviewed in conjunction with the design of the state-police computer system, the one we got $10 million to enhance.''
Davis said that two weeks after the deadline, state officials still were putting final touches on the procedures and that work was being done on the computer system to ``capture the information.''
These explanations left critics unimpressed.
``Nothing has happened yet,'' said Lenora Lapidus, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, which has called for a civilian auditor to monitor reform of the state police.
``We've been very concerned all along that they are missing deadlines and that they are not carrying through on things they say they will do,'' she said, adding that Davis' explanation ``does not give me much greater comfort.''
The deadlines are contained in two reports - released April 20 and July 2 - written by Paul H. Zoubek, first assistant attorney general. The reports declared that the state police ``is in need of significant change'' and established deadlines for those changes.
The first deadline was May 20, when an internal report was to be made to the attorney general ``on specific recommendations for legislation that would create new official-misconduct offenses to deal specifically with the use of police authority to knowingly or purposely violate a citizen's civil rights.''
The Legislative Black and Latino Caucus on Thursday urged that such misconduct - specifically racial profiling - be deemed a third-degree criminal offense.
Davis said a draft of legislation had been forwarded to the attorney general, but he would not reveal the details of that legislation.
He said the absence of a nominee to replace Col. Carl A. Williams, whom Gov. Whitman dismissed as state police superintendent last winter, had not interfered with meeting deadlines.
``We're moving forward with them,'' he said of the reforms. ``When a new one [superintendent] is put in position, he'll help or lead the implementation.''
