Fatal Encounters record · Independent third-party dataset
Maurice S. Gordon Jr.
May 23, 2020 · Bass River, Burlington County
Details as recorded
Every value below is shown exactly as Fatal Encounters recorded it.[1]
- Name as recorded
- Maurice S. Gordon Jr.
- Age as recorded
- 28
- Gender as recorded
- Male
- Race as reported
- African-American/Black
- Date of the injury resulting in death
- May 23, 2020
- Location as recorded
- Bass River, Burlington CountyGarden State Parkway near Bass River Township exit Bass River NJ 8087 Burlington
- Highest level of force as recorded
- Gunshot
Where the dataset places it
The marked point is the dataset's own geocoded location for this record, as recorded. Every other New Jersey record in the dataset is shown in gray. A point on a map is where a death was recorded, not a finding about anyone.
Agencies as recorded
Agency or agencies involved, as recorded: New Jersey State Police
An agency appears here because it appears in the record's as-reported agency field, nothing more. Its presence is not a claim of fault or responsibility.
Department pages (matched by this site at high confidence)
What this site holds on the agencies named
Separate records, shown here so they can be found from this page. Nothing below is connected to this death. The Fatal Encounters dataset does not link the two, the Attorney General's releases do not, and neither does this site. The years each figure covers are printed for the same reason.
- New Jersey State Police
Reported 4,389 internal affairs investigations across 2021 to 2025. 106 major discipline records name officers at this agency.
The source's account
Fatal Encounters' description of the incident, verbatim. This is the source project's own third-party narrative, not this site's reporting.
Maurice S. Gordon was shot and killed by a state trooper about 6:30 a.m. Gordon was unarmed and was waiting with the officer for a tow truck when a struggle began, and the officer shot and killed Gordon.
Source reported by Fatal Encounters: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/08/nyregion/maurice-gordon-nj-killed.html (external link, as recorded in the dataset).
If you are a family member of the person named here, or represent one, and something in this record is wrong, or you want the record removed, requests go through the corrections page. Every request is checked against the source record.
This is one of 19 New Jersey records the dataset dates to 2020, and one of 19 it holds for Burlington County across 2000 to 2021. Browse every New Jersey Fatal Encounters record by year.
Records from the same county and year
- Keron Roundtree (2020) October 27, 2020
Questions and answers
What does the Fatal Encounters dataset record about this incident?
Fatal Encounters records that Maurice S. Gordon Jr. died on May 23, 2020 in Bass River, Burlington County, with "Gunshot" as the highest level of force. Fatal Encounters is an independent, crowdsourced dataset of deaths that occurred during police encounters of any kind; a record is not a finding of fault or misconduct.
Which agency or agencies were recorded as involved?
The record's agency field reads "New Jersey State Police". Presence in that field means the agency appears in the record as reported, nothing more; it is not a claim of fault or responsibility by any officer or agency.
Where did this happen?
The record places the death in Bass River, Burlington County, on May 23, 2020. The address as recorded is Garden State Parkway near Bass River Township exit Bass River NJ 8087 Burlington.
Sources
- [1]Fatal Encounters, New Jersey subset. Fatal Encounters (fatalencounters.org). Row 3264. Derived from the public Fatal Encounters national dataset (coverage 2000-2021; collection ended December 2021), https://fatalencounters.org/. Retrieved July 10, 2026. ↩