State Police Train at Mall at Short Hills

The police activity some people may have seen at the Mall at Short Hills on Tuesday was a training session by New Jersey State Police.

Millburn Police Lt. Peter Eakley, who was the local contact for the exercise, said it was a Threat Deployment Exercise, which trained them how to respond to potential targets like a mall. He said the Mall at Short Hills is not an active target.

Most of the training exercise details are classified because they relate to homeland security measures, but they analyzed how they would deploy people and reviewed plans, Eakley said. Most of the measures are things people would not see, including intelligence gathering.

The exercise gives everyone practice and experience in cases that could happen at the Mall at Short Hills or any other New Jersey mall, he said.