No Charges Against Piscataway Cop Who Killed Man Who Had Just Killed His Mother, Grandparents

PISCATAWAY, NJ — On Monday, a grand jury voted not to file any criminal charges against a Piscataway police officer who killed a man who had just stabbed his mother and grandparents to death inside the family home.

This happened in early January at a home on River Road in Piscataway. Jordan Barnes, 29, lived there with his mother and father.

Barnes had recently graduated from Rutgers, wherehis Instagram account shows he was on the crew team, and he was described by those who knew him as "a highly intelligent” young man who worked as a mechanical engineer.

On the evening of January 5, 2026, he fatally stabbed his mother, Jeanmarie Barnes, 60, his grandfather, Richard Barnes, 86, and his grandmother, Brenda Barnes, 84, and was then shot and killed by a responding police officer, New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport.

Davenport said Piscataway Police Officer John Ward shot Barnes, killing him, after Barnes refused police commands to stop, and walked towards officers holding a large knife.

The NJ Attorney General investigated the incident, as the state is required to investigate any time someone is killed during an encounter with law enforcement in New Jersey. All such investigations must be presented to a grand jury to determine if the police officer committed any wrongdoing. On Monday, the grand jury finished its deliberations and voted “no bill,” concluding no criminal charges should be filed against Ward.

This link has the 911 calls made that night, plus the body-camera footage from five police officers who responded. Warning: The videos are violent, shows a man being shot and killed by police, and may be difficult for some people to watch. Representatives of Barnes’ family were given an opportunity to see the recordings before the Attorney General released them to the public.

The Attorney General released a timeline of what happened that evening:

The Piscataway Police Department received two 911 calls starting at 5:30 p.m. In the first, a woman could be heard yelling, “Stop! Stop!” along with other commotion and yelling. That call came from the cell phone of Jeanmarie Barnes, Barnes' mother. A second 911 call then came from Barnes' father. He told police he ran outside the home, and Barnes was still inside, threatening to stab his whole family.

"Please, please," the man begs to the 911 operator, according to the 911 call. "He said he's going to kill us all, he's f— going ballistic. Please help!"

The father told the 911 operator he was standing outside in his socks. He said he did not want to go back to the house, because he was scared Barnes would chase him.

"He'll chase me, I don't know if he has a knife in his hands. He's running around, he's outside right now screaming," said his father.

"Has this ever happened before?" asked the 911 operator.

"No, he's never been violent. Never," replied the man.

Three minutes later, at approximately 5:33 p.m., the first of multiple Piscataway police officers arrived at the home and observed Jordan Barnes standing on the front porch. As that officer approached, Barnes picked up a knife from the ground, then went inside the house and locked the front door. The officer then spoke with Barnes' father, who was standing in the driveway.

The father told police there were three people inside the house with Jordan.

"He's going crazy," Barnes' father shouts at police. "They're all in there with him! He said he's gonna slash their throats."

Jordan Barnes then appeared in the second-story window, made a gesture to his neck, and yelled to the officers that they were not getting inside the house.

"You're not getting in this f— house!" Barnes shouted at officers, and then closed the window.

Multiple officers then assembled on the front porch of the residence. As one officer attempted to speak with Jordan Barnes through the closed front door, Officer Ward looked through the front door’s sidelight and observed two people lying inside on the floor.

"We got people on the ground; we gotta make entry," one police officer is heard saying.

"We gotta make entry, we got victims," another officer said.

Officers then determined they would enter the home using a key provided by the father. The officers opened the front door and encountered Jordan Barnes holding a kitchen knife in his left hand. Officers commanded Barnes to put the knife down and get on the ground. Barnes did not drop the knife or get on the ground ; instead, he advanced toward the officers, said Davenport. Three officers discharged their tasers to no effect.

Ward then fired his service weapon, striking Barnes. Barnes collapsed as he was shot; officers provided immediate medical aid and EMTs pronounced Barnes dead at the scene. Authorities recovered a large kitchen knife from the front porch, which Barnes had been holding, and a second broken knife from the immediate threshold of the entrance.

After the shooting, police found his mother and grandparents dead inside the home; all had suffered multiple suspected stab wounds.

The Attorney General's investigation included witness interviews, photographs, radio transmissions, video footage and autopsy results from the medical examiner. All that evidence, including video of the incident, was presented to a state grand jury.

First Patch report on this incident: Man Shot By Police After Mother, Grandparents Found Dead In Piscataway (Jan. 6, 2026)

'He's Going Ballistic': Body Camera Video Released In Piscataway Triple Murder, Fatal Police Shooting (March 2026)

Who was Jordan Barnes?

Barnes graduated from Rutgers University with a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering, and he had professional experience working in data software, according to his LinkedIn profile.

At the time of his death, Barnes worked with his mother at TechniQuest Corporation, an engineering firm located in Princeton, NJ.com previously reported. His mother worked for years there as a senior accountant. Her son worked for TechniQuest for about a year and a half after he graduated from Rutgers.

A person close to the family described Barnes as a “highly intelligent” mechanical engineer.

While at Rutgers, he was a member of the Rutgers crew team, his profile says. This Instagram account shows a photo of him with the Rutgers crew team.