Black New Jersey Cop Called ‘Outright Liar’ After Reporting White Captain for Using N-Word Over Radio Even as Other Officers Heard It, Lawsuit Claims

A Black police officer in Asbury Park, New Jersey will receive nearly $1.2 million in a settlement of his lawsuit claiming that he faced racial discrimination and retaliation from the city and its police department after reporting a captain’s use of a racial slur.

Ahmed Lawson was 18 years into his service with the Asbury Park Police Department in 2022 and out on patrol overseeing a road construction job when he thought he heard Patrol Captain John Crescio use the “n-word” on a police radio transmission, according to his lawsuit filed in June of 2022 and obtained by Atlanta Black Star.

On a taped line, Crescio appeared to say, “Oh sh-t, they drug that [n-word] out of there,” the complaint says. After hearing this, Lawson approached Lt. Michael Barnes, who worked in Internal Affairs, and Officer Josh Kendle, who both reported they heard Crescio use the n-word during the live radio transmission, as did two other Internal Affairs officers who later heard the tape.

Crescio denied using the slur. During a deposition, he testified that his radio microphone had accidentally turned on while he was speaking on the phone with a friend about deer hunting, and that he was talking about “big bucks chasing the does,” reported TransparencyNJ.

Crescio testified that when he learned of the allegation, he told Internal Affairs that the person who reported it was “an outright liar” and that “the incident never occurred.”

Shortly after Lawson made his complaint, Crescio initiated Internal Affairs complaints against Lawson, Barnes and Kendle, alleging the three had conspired to fabricate the charge against him. Internal Affairs removed Barnes.

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Despite the fact that “half a dozen people believed” that Crescio used the slur, the lawsuit said, the prosecutor’s office did not sustain the complaints against him.

Lt. Daniel Kowsaluk, an Internal Affairs officer, also recommended exonerating Lawson, Kendle and Barnes from Crescio’s complaint, and a later court filing by Lawson says officials did so.

Lawson claimed that his report of the racial slur by the white captain, which came at a time when other Black officers were publicly complaining about racial discrimination and disparate treatment in the department, led the department to retaliate against him by denying him a promotion to sergeant.

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In March 2021, an attorney for Sgt. Marshawn Love deposed Lawson in Love’s lawsuit against the department, in which he alleged racial discrimination and retaliation after he reported an off-duty officer who killed his wife. The city ultimately paid $1.25 million in July 2023 to settle Love’s claims.

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Under the June 15, 2026, settlement agreement obtained by TransparentNJ, the New Jersey Intergovernmental Insurance Fund, on behalf of Asbury Park, agreed to pay $1,185,000 to Lawson in four installments between July and October to resolve his employment-related claims.

The agreement stated that the settlement, which included attorneys’ fees and costs, did not constitute an admission of wrongdoing or liability and that the parties entered it “solely for the purpose of economic expediency.”

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