The North Bergen Police Department held a ceremony yesterday at Township Hall to promote Police Officers Alfredo Echeverria and Roberto Ruiz to higher ranks.
Echeverria has been on the North Bergen Police force for 12 years and was promoted to Sergeant, while Ruiz, on the force for 14 years, is now a lieutenant.
Police Chief Robert Dowd introduced the two officers before conferring the oaths of office.
“Ruiz has worked on a variety of assignments [such as] patrol division…he worked in the traffic unit, he was recently in charge of school resource officers, as you know we have a police officer in every school. He was also on loan to the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office gang task force, he brings with him really a wealth of experience. I’m really happy to see him get promoted,” said Dowd.
He praised Echeverria for his tenure to date on the force.
“Promoted to the rank of Sergeant today is Alfredo Echeverria, a 12-year veteran who has worked primarily in the patrol division, although he did work in community policing for a significant amount of time …He was officer of the month in May 2009, and also in May 2018, so May is a very good productive month for him,” Dowd said.
Ruiz said in an interview that he’ll be joining his squad first thing tomorrow after spending the past six months studying case law and how to apply it when officers are addressing a criminal offense or a moving violation pertaining to New Jersey Statute Title 39, which consists of different statutes regarding motor vehicles and traffic regulations.
“A lot of studying, for sure, it’s a sacrifice. Instead of going out on the weekends, I had to hit the books so that I could get promoted,” said Ruiz.
Echeverria said, too, he had to sacrifice a lot of time with his family so that he could prepare, but he’s looking forward to the next challenge as the NBPD’s newest sergeant.
“With 12 years of experience, you kinda of inside looking out, now I’m outside looking in. Twelve years of knowing the right thing [to do] and the wrong thing, how to tweak things to make them better. I think I’ll be applying that to my men, how to make it better, and safer, because at the end of the day you want to go home safely,” said Echeverria.
We streamed the ceremony live on our Facebook Page, which can be viewed below:
https://www.facebook.com/hudsoncountyview/videos/2325963704288015/
