Authorities say Marshall Zamor swallowed an unknown object before he died. His family wants video proof.
TRENTON -- State investigators say a New Jersey man who died in police custody last month had swallowed a plastic bag of suspected crack cocaine before he lost consciousness in a holding cell, but members of the man's family are calling on authorities release video evidence from the case.
The state Attorney General's Office released new details from their investigation into the March 29 death of Marshall Zamor on Tuesday, just an hour before his family and members of the Black Lives Matter movement held a press conference outside the state justice complex in Trenton demanding answers.
Zamor's cousin, Jaimie Jerome, said investigators kept the man's widow in the dark for nearly two weeks after his death.
Authorities say Zamor, of Sicklerville in Camden County, collapsed after troopers tried unsuccessfully to remove an object he was allegedly hiding in his mouth.
Zamor, 39, was pulled over on the Atlantic City Expressway in Winslow Township on the morning of March 29 "because the windows of his vehicle had illegal tinting," according to a statement from the state Division of Criminal Justice, which investigates in-custody deaths involving state troopers.
The trooper who pulled Zamor over allegedly smelled marijuana, ordered the man out of the car and found "what appeared to be two marijuana 'blunts,'" authorities said.
Man died in State Police custody
Zamor was arrested and taken to a holding cell at the expressway State Police station. As he was awaiting processing, authorities claim troopers at the station observed "something in his mouth" but the man "would not cooperate and open his mouth to surrender the object."
According to the statement from the Attorney General's Office, the troopers retrieved plastic gloves and one of them "was able to swipe a chunk of a white rocklike substance from Zamor's mouth, but he was unable to remove all of the partially chewed substance."
"Troopers held Zamor during these efforts, but no force was used by the troopers beyond the force needed to hold him and attempt to swipe the object from his mouth," the statement said. "Zamor did not appear to be in distress during or after these attempts to remove the object."
Police, meanwhile, called for an EMS crew "reporting that a prisoner had ingested suspected crack cocaine," the statement said.
Shortly after noon, the man began convulsing and lost consciousness.
Troopers attempted CPR and used a defibrillator but were unable to revive Zamor, authorities said. An EMS crew was also unable to revive him and took the man to Atantic City Medical Center in Galloway, where he was pronounced dead.
Authorities said toxicology tests and an autopsy were not finished, but during the autopsy "a plastic bag was found obstructing Zamor's larynx and a firm white substance was found in the larynx."
Family members said a lack of transparency from authorities investigated the case made them skeptical of the police account. They called on authorities to release troop car dashboard and body camera videos of Zamor's arrest, as well as any surveillance footage from inside the station or the man's holding cell.
Reading a statement on behalf of Zamor's family, Jerome said the man's wife, Dominique, was reeling from the loss of "her soulmate."
"Marshall did not have friends because, to him, everyone was family," she said of the father of three.
Many of the details released Tuesday were news to Zamor's family, his cousin said.
"People may have their opinions and comments" about the circumstances of his death, she said. "To that, I ask this question: What if it was your husband, your father, your son or your friend? Would you not want to know what happened?"
Peter Aseltine, a spokesman for the attorney general, told NJ Advance Media a victim-witness advocate from the office had spoken to Zamor's wife, as well as a representative from the state Medical Examiner's Office. Attorneys from his office had also contacted the family's attorney on Tuesday prior to their public statement.
"They will continue to be in contact with the family as appropriate," he said.
Reached by phone, the family's attorney, John R. Stein, said they had retained his firm after their requests for basic information went unanswered, and the office only publicly acknowledged Zamor's death after local media followed up on a press release family members sent out a week after the incident.
Standing outside the justice complex on Tuesday, April Grant, a Black Lives Matter organizer from Camden, said Zamor's widow had to learn the details of her husband's demise from media reports.
"Maybe Mrs. Zamor should have been a news reporter," Grant said. "Maybe then she would have gotten a response the day she asked."
S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.