The Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (OPIA) has released radio recordings and video from four police body cameras tied to a fatal police-involved shooting on March 16, 2026, in the Lanoka Harbor area of Lacey Township, New Jersey. The civilian who died in the incident was previously identified as 55-year-old Susanne Clarke of Lacey.
The Office of Public Integrity and Accountability is investigating the fatal shooting. The recordings are being released under policies set by the Attorney General’s Office in 2019 to ensure fair, impartial, and transparent reviews of police use of deadly force.
Officials said that Clarke’s family had the chance to view the recordings before they were made public.
Preliminary reports indicate that just after 2 a.m., four Lacey Township police officers responded to Clarke’s home on Hemlock Drive, near Birch Road in the Lanoka Harbor area.
They were called after Clarke dialed 911, saying she thought she was having a heart attack. When the officers arrived, they found her inside, speaking to them through a window.
They asked her to come to the front door, but she told them to leave her alone and refused to come out.
The officers remained on scene and continued to tell Clarke that they needed to speak with her to ensure her well-being. EMS personnel also arrived on scene. Officers intermittently heard Clarke shouting at them to leave and observed her moving within the residence and lying on the floor.
About 30 minutes after arriving, Officer Dallas Gant looked through the rear glass sliding door of the home and saw a dog with a knife wound. Officers tried to get inside, including by kicking the front door, but couldn’t gain entry.
Officer Gant then attempted to climb in through a side window but quickly backed out when he saw Clarke enter the room holding a knife. She then came out through the rear sliding door with the knife in hand and moved toward several officers. Both Officer Gant and another officer ordered her to drop it.
When she didn’t, Officer Gant fired multiple shots, hitting Clarke. Medical aid was provided, but she was pronounced dead at the scene at 3:24 a.m. A knife was recovered.
The radio recordings and video footage are available here: https://njoag.box.com/s/t059mdzkldska43t4ip7g4s6a9y4u43k
In 2019, a law known as N.J.S.A. 52:17B-107a(2) was passed, requiring the Attorney General’s Office to investigate any death that happens during an encounter with a law enforcement officer acting in their official capacity, or when the person is in custody.
All such cases must then be brought before a grand jury to decide if there’s enough evidence to indict the officer or officers involved.
The investigation is ongoing, and no further information is available at this time.
Susanne Michele Clarke was born October 31, 1970, in New Brunswick. She was predeceased by her mother, Kathleen, and her sister, Jessica. She is survived by her children, Caroline and Chad; her ex-husband, Raymond; her stepfather, Mark; and her sisters, Kristin and Jane.
Sue Clarke spent many years in Chesterfield, a township in Burlington County, raising her children and working at Clipper Magazine as an Account Executive. She recently moved to Lanoka Harbor to enjoy life closer to the beach. She had registered as an unaffiliated voter in Ocean County in November 2024.
She typically voted in presidential elections. She was, by the metrics we use to measure civic participation, an ordinary American doing her modest democratic duty every four years and otherwise getting on with the business of living — raising children, working in optical care, planning a small business, loving her dogs, moving to the Jersey Shore for a fresh chapter in life.
Her family gathered to celebrate her life on Friday, March 27th, at the Rezem Funeral Home in East Brunswick. In lieu of flowers, her family has asked that donations be made to the Friends of Southern Ocean County Animal Shelter, which is caring for Sammy and AJ.
That chapter ended when she reached for her phone in the dark hours of a March morning and trusted the system.
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