Brick Police Cleared In Death Of Distressed Man In Lake Riviera, Attorney General Says

BRICK, NJ — Brick Township police officers have been cleared of wrongdoing in the death of a Brick Township man who died after they found him in distress in the middle of a Lake Riviera street in 2024, the New Jersey Attorney General's Office said Wednesday.

Robert Gotts, 36, was pronounced dead at Ocean University Medical Center in Brick on May 9, 2024, the attorney general's office said in its report on the incident.

Brick Township Police Officers Joseph McGrath and Mark Nixon and Sgt. Jeffrey Person responded to Wisteria and Vermont drives in Lake Riviera at 4:27 p.m. that day for a report of a man in distress in the street.

Bodyworn camera footage of the incident released by the attorney general's office shows Gotts writhing in pain on the road. He tells the officers he had taken hallucinogenic mushrooms and said he had been bitten by a viper.

The video shows the officers working for several minutes to encourage Gotts to stand up and get out of the road, and Gotts can be seen grinding his face into the asphalt and moaning in pain. At one point in the video he turns his head and his face can be seen bloodied from where he has been rubbing it on the street.

Gotts repeatedly says he's been bitten and at one point says the viper is still on him, apparently hallucinating.

"C'mon, you gotta go on the grass, you're going to hurt yourself," one of the officers can be heard saying as they tried for more than 6 minutes to talk to him and get him out of the street. "We're trying to help you."

Finally the officers handcuff him and lift him off the road and place him on the front lawn of a home while they wait for Brick Township EMS to arrive.

"C'mon, you gotta go on the grass, you're going to hurt yourself," one of the officers can be heard saying. "We're trying to help you."

The 12-minute, 17-second video, which is redacted because Gotts is naked, stops when EMS arrives and prepares to put him on a stretcher.

The attorney general's office report said Gotts was pronounced dead at Ocean University Medical Center at 5:48 p.m. An autopsy was performed and the medical examiner concluded Gotts' death was accidental are resulted from drug intoxication, the report said.

The attorney general's office said the information about the investigation was presented to a state grand jury, which voted Monday "no bill," meaning no criminal charges should be filed against the officers who responded to the incident.

The bodycam footage was shown to Gotts' family before the attorney general's office released it. Patch is not publishing the video.