The Division of State Police (New Jersey State Police), part of the Department of Law and Public Safety of the State of New Jersey, officially certified on August 14, 2026 that a review of the criminal history of César Manuel Cardoso Matos DePaço revealed no record in the state's official systems.
The certification was issued following a formal fingerprint-based inquiry into the two principal criminal record systems of the State of New Jersey: the New Jersey Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) and the New Jersey Computerized Criminal History (CCH).
The official response, signed by Major Edward Colleton, Commanding Officer of the Identification & Information Technology Section of the State Police, and notarized by Public Notary Lisa Palermo, is unequivocal:
These searches failed to reveal any criminal history record information indexed by the New Jersey State Police (NJSP) or the State Bureau of Identification (SBI).
This document complements the certificate issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on August 13, 2026, which had already attested to the absence of any prior arrest record at the U.S. federal level. Together, the two certificates cover the two jurisdictional levels applicable to a resident of the State of New Jersey — federal and state — constituting the most complete official verification that a private individual can obtain to attest to the absence of a criminal record in the United States of America.
Based in the United States for approximately three decades, César DePaço is founder and Executive Director of Summit Nutritionals International Inc.® and Chairman of the Board of the DePaço Foundation. Over the years, he has stood out for his unwavering support of American law enforcement, with regular and documented donations to police departments in multiple states — including New Jersey itself.
The public release of these two official certificates reflects César DePaço's ongoing commitment to complete transparency before public opinion, at a time when he continues to be the target of media narratives in Portugal that insinuate — without any factual basis — alleged connections to matters of a criminal nature.
