The husband of a New Jersey mayor says the public should leave her alone after she was allegedly caught drunk driving with their toddler in her BMW.
‘It’s not like she’s the mayor of some big city,’ said Jason Carty of his wife, Lumberton Mayor Gina LaPlaca, who was arrested last month after she allegedly picked up her son at daycare and drove him home while drunk.
‘Lumberton has only 13,000 people. All I want is for my wife to get better and for everyone to leave her alone.’
Carty, a former fire chief for Westhampton, told The Philadelphia Inquirer that LaPlaca, 45, is ‘in an inpatient facility and on a path to recovery.’
LaPlaca was censured by the township’s committee last week, and was asked to ‘put her public duties aside’ by governor Phil Phurphy.
Bu the Democrat has refused to resign, despite the bodycam footage of her arrest going viral.
That stubbornness has infuriated many locals from both sides of the political aisle.
LaPlaca was seen stumbling and slurring her words after she was approached by cops outside her $640,000 home at around 5:40pm on March 17.
An officer spoke to LaPlaca as she picked her young toddler out of her powerful BMW 5-Series sedan, asking her: ‘Are you okay?’
Jason Carty had a shocking defense of his wife, Lumberton Mayor Gina LaPlaca, following her arrest for driving drunk with her toddler in the car
LaPlaca was seen in police bodycam footage stumbling and slurring her words after she was approached by cops outside her home on March 17
The Democratic mayor of Lumberton has entered treatment since her arrest last month
‘Yes, I am,’ she responds, before staggering toward her car almost immediately, as a cop asked about the sedan’s ruined passenger wing mirror.
LaPlaca was ordered to take a field sobriety test on the street outside her home, and after being asked what she had drank, she responded: ‘A little bit of vodka.’
The mayor was seen struggling to place one foot in front of the other as she failed the sobriety test, before she began weeping as she was placed in handcuffs.
‘I’m sorry,’ she added to officers, to which one responds: ‘That’s okay.’
Police said they confronted LaPlaca at her home after a bystander reported seeing her driving erratically earlier in the afternoon, reports 6ABC.
The witness was seen in bodycam footage telling officers he saw LaPlaca’s vehicle swerving off the road, and the footage showed the side wingmirror on the mayor’s vehicle had been damaged.
The witness went on to say they grew more concerned after realizing she had a toddler in her backseat.
After the mayor was arrested outside her home, officers searched her vehicle and found a small liquor bottle and a water bottle with alcohol in it.
She had reportedly told officers that she had just come back home from picking up her two-year-old from daycare.
Following her arrest, LaPlaca’s husband Jason Carty defended the mayor on social media and announced that she would seek treatment for addiction
LaPlaca is facing calls for her resignation from Lumberton residents over her DUI arrest
Shortly after her arrest, LaPlaca’s husband Jason Carty said she was seeking treatment for addiction in rehab.
LaPlaca was elected to the Township Committee in Lumberton in 2020 and re-elected in 2023, however her arrest came just a week after she resigned as business administrator in neighboring Neptune Township.
She had previously been arrested at her home in 2023 after she was accused of assaulting her husband, according to the Democrat and Chronicle.
Charges against her were later dismissed and the arrest was expunged from her record, with Carty later saying he took responsibility for the incident.
LaPlaca is facing calls for her resignation from Lumberton residents, and a township committee meeting days after her arrest saw locals furiously demand she steps aside.
One resident reportedly told the meeting that LaPlaca was ‘compromising the position of our law enforcement.’
‘I’m asking for a motion that you deem her noncompetent and remove her from town council,’ the resident said, per 6ABC.
One of the members of the committee, Terrance Benson, joined the calls for LaPlaca to resign, saying: ‘My personal opinion is for the mayor to step down and to heal herself.’
LaPlaca is next due in court on April 28.
