TOWN WATCH
NEWARK – The worst of the beating made by seven men September 2019 on an eighth inmate, rendering him partially incapacitated by mental injury, at the Essex County Correctional Center, will not get out until the year 2113.
Superior Court Judge Ronald D. Wigler, from his Newark bench Sept. 12 added 20 years on to the 70-year sentence of Darryl Watson, 22, of Newark, is currently serving regarding the September 2019 attempted murder of Jayshawn Boyd, 22, of Newark and Elizabeth.
Watson and the to-be-sentenced Byad Lockett were found guilty by a jury here June 16 of attempted murder and aggravated assault of Boyd plus related weapons charges. A third man was convicted on weapons charges but was cleared of attempted murder and aggravated assault.
Watson and Lockett, who were of the seven in the two-minute beating of Boyd in the county jail’s C-Pod. The pair had rendered Boyd unconscious from the punching and kicking – but landed the pod’s microwave oven, water dispenser and industrial mop bucket on his head.
The injuries put Boyd in a coma for several months. and left him with the inability to perform simple tasks. Boyd, who had been diagnosed as having schizophrenia, was in jail for failing to appear in court.
Watson was serving 70 years after being convicted June 28 in the February 2019 murder of Fred Sims, of Newark.
This may not be the last one reads of this case. Lockett has yet to be sentenced and the dispositions of the other five have not been determined. Boyd’s attorney, Brooke Barnett, has filed suit against Esses County and particular officials – including County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo.
IRVINGTON – Newark police detectives are investigating the circumstances of how a woman was shot in its Ironbound section – and why she went to an address here Sept. 17.
The Newark part of the story began with callers in the area of streets Pennington Court, East Kinney and Court telling of seven or eight gunshots being fired at around 3:15 a.m. that Sunday.
Responding NPD officers combed the area for any victims and evidence. They would find one victim in Irvington – by the Verizon telephone exchange building at 9 Coit St., later that early morning.
The woman said that one of her feet was shot while she was at Newark’s Scott and Mulberry streets – and that she took “a private vehicle” for the approximately two mile west trip.
The victim was taken to a local hospital, where her injury was deemed non-life-threatening. The case remains under NPD investigation.
EAST ORANGE – The Newark police division released a video recording of one of the two suspects whose dispute with the Rev. Timothy Huff there Aug. 24 resulted in the East Orange pastor being critically shot.
The NPD footage, taken from the 40 block of North Fourth Street at about 1:30 a.m., shows a woman standing next to a dark green four-door late model BMW with Nevada license plates. The woman appears to be wearing shoulder-length black hair, a black t-shirt with a printed photo front, white or light blue cutoff shorts and sandals.
It is not known whether the suspect or the second woman with her fired gunshots through Huff’s front window and interior wall before the pastor was struck in the stomach while lying on a couch. Nor is it clear as of press time whether either one or both the ones accused of vandalizing a car parked in a gated driveway.
The NPD incident reports that Huff and family members caught the two women taking an outside rear-view mirror of the parked car and confronted them. They came back to the scene about 30 minutes later, one of whom fired rounds off a handgun.
Huff is Senior Pastor of Green Pasture Missionary Baptist Church, 50 North Maple Ave. on Peck’s Ridge. Relatives and congregants have held prayer vigils here and at Newark’s University Hospital. A GoFundMe.com page has been established for Huff’s medical expenses.
ORANGE – The Orange Fire Department had put out mourning bunting for 30 days for a retired of one of its own – William O’Neill. O’Neill, 86, who was an Orange native for 31 years and an OFD member for 32 years, died at his Livingston home there on Aug. 20.
O’Neill was born in Orange Oct. 22, 1936, was a city product. He joined “Orange’s Bravest” in 1967. He had retired from the force in 1991.
“Bill” and his wife, Mary Jane moved to Livingston in 1969 to raise sons Joseph and Willam and daughters Lu Anne Marotta and Darlene Bell. The former Mary Jane Scarone predeceased him. Brother John Edward O’Neill, five grandchildren and a great-granddaughter are also among his survivors.
A memorial visitation was held Aug. 28 at Caldwell’s Paul Ippolito-Dancy Funeral Home. (The Ippolito home was also from Orange.), followed by entombment later that day at East Hanover’s Gate of Heaven Cemetery.
Memorial donations may be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 501 St Jude Place, Memphis, TN 38105 or stjude.org.
WEST ORANGE / SOUTH ORANGE – The South Orange Public Library Board of Trustees are mulling over how architect Andrew Berman has in mind to connect the current 1968 library building with its predecessor almost next door.
The Connection as Berman, of his self-named New York firm, at the SOPL BOT meeting foresees, is a two-story building connecting the current building with the Connett Memorial Library. The second story is a see-through atrium like ceiling, crowning a first-story housing library material holdings and special collections.
Berman said that The Connection would double the Children’s Library and create “an open, flexible space” for special events. He left open what furniture would exactly go into The Connection outside of a kitchenette.
SOPL, as an institution, will be going full circle, The Connection marks a return of the Connett Library, which had been the EIES books on tape facility for the blind since the new library was opened.
The village has bonded $16 million for The Connection and related improvements. $6.5 million comes as an award from the 2021-22 N.J. State Library Construction Bond Act.
The state awards have also fueled the impending move of the West Orange Public Library to a former office building at 10 Rooney Circle – which now has a Nov. 1 public grand opening. Improvements at the East Orange and Newark public libraries are also among the awardees.
SOPL Trustees’ next step is to put out a request for construction bids from prospective contractors.
MAPLEWOOD – The South Orange-Maplewood School District’s administration has been since Sept. 18 digesting an equity audit commissioned from the Rutgers University Disproportionality and Equity Laboratory.
Called “The Fergus Report” after Rutgers Professor Dr. Eddie Fergus, the document was the result of SOMSD’s settlement (before Superior Court Judge John E. Wallace) with the SOMA Black Parents Workshop over racial disparities in June.
The audit, presented by Dr. Fergus himself in a special school board meeting Sept 18, confirmed was some people in the two-town district have been asserting since 2014. There is a disparity between Caucasian and non-white students in taking Advance Placement courses and tests. The current modification and expansion of school buildings will help on a long-term basis.
The SOMSD Board of Education ended that Monday night’s report here by extending the district’s settlement with SOMA BPW for three years. Dr. Fergus or a representative will be meanwhile providing quarterly reports.
BLOOMFIELD – A celebration of Tony-winning actor Michael J. McGrath’s life. McGrath, 65, who was a Laurel Avenue resident, suddenly died in his sleep Sept. 14.
McGrath – who was born Sept. 25, 1957, in Worcester, Mass., – appeared in 12 Broadway plays. He won a Tony Award in 2012 for his portrayal of Cookie McGee in “Nice Work if You Can Get it.”
He also received notices for his depiction of “Patsy” in Monty Python’s “Spamalot” plus similar roles in “Memphis,” “Plaza Suite,” “She Loves Me,” “Tootsie” and “On the Twentieth Century.” He also played Martin Short’s sidekick in television’s “The Martin Short Show.” Locally, he played Ralph Kramden in a 2017 stage revival of “The Honeymooners” at Millburn’s Paper Mill Playhouse.
McGrath and wife Toni Di Buono McGrath moved here from metropolitan Boston, in the late 1990s after stints at the Worcester County Light Opera, The Foothills Theatre and Boston Conservatory of Music. He generally took roles befitting what colleague Michael Urbie called his “adorable, mischievous” nature and first took critical notice 2007’s revival of “Follies.”
“Very saddened to hear that Michael McGrath, our first and most beloved ‘Patsy’ of ‘Spamalot,’ has passed away.” said Monty Python’s Eric Idle. “Warm hugs to all the ‘Spamalot’ family and very happy memories of a lovely man.”
Daughter Katie Claire McGrath, brothers Jay P. and Stephen F. McGrath and sisters Joan M. McGrath and Susan M. Nash are also among his survivors.
MONTCLAIR – The township administration and council recently received a report from human resources consultant Culturupt – and if a leaked source to a reporter of the assessment is to be believed, it is not pretty.
Culturupt, who was proposed by Mary Sean Spiller Oct. 20, 2022 and approved by the council that December, conducted a cultural and climate survey early this year among Montclair’s elders, Acting Township Attorney Paul Burr, Acting/Deputy Town Manager Brian Scantlebury and employees in 205 Claremont Ave. The $15,000 report, made in July, was based on interviews and responses of 140 of Montclair’s 430 employees.
Of the responses, 65 percent said they would not recommend the Township of Montclair as a place to work. The respondents added that they feel that the Mayor and Township Council would not protect or trust them to do their jobs and were quick to blame them whenever residents complained.
Responding employees cite a leadership vacuum that had developed around Scantlebury after Tom Manager Timothy Stafford’s October administrative leave and April dismissal. They also cited the behavior of Siller and the Township Council in creating “a toxic culture.”
Montclair Fire Department employees, who were the largest participating department, cited low morale and worker turnover among their ranks. Some also cited on how the recent promotional process was conducted.
Councilman David Cummings grouped the Culturupt report with November’s O’Toole Scrivo LLC report on racial discrimination accusations in MFD as a report as one commissioned by ” the Governing Body with a predetermined outcome.” He has supported on Scantlebury.
BELLEVILLE – Belleville Superintendent Dr. Richard J. Tomko confirmed at Sept 18’s Board of Education Trustees meeting that his staff are back at 335 Union Ave. after a three month absence.
Tomko added that Belleville Public Schools has paid landlord Michael Melham almost $12,600 in back rent into September. He did not say whether the staff will honor the lease’s life with Melham.
BPS’ Board of Education Trustees, in a 4-2 vote with one abstention, had approved leasing 335 Union Ave.’s basement and first floor in January 2021. School administrators moved into the 2.5-story mixed use commercial-residential hose from across School 3 that summer – and moved out, with no explanation given, in June 2023.
It is not known whether BPS’ moving back into 335 Union Ave. will quash possible litigation Melham had been pursuing this summer against the school district.
Melham had applied an OPRA request to the Town Clerk’s office to solidify a possible breach of lease suit against BPS. That breach was supposedly caused when the district had moved out in June 2023 and when it had supposedly authorized electrical contracting work without Melham’s consent.
That construction work, done last summer, was authorized by the Lyndhurst construction code official. Belleville’s official could not inspect or approve the work since he has a harassment and retaliation lawsuit against Mayor Michael Melham.
Melham, as “A Better Belleville” campaign manager, had aided in Trustees’ Gabrielle Bennett-Meany and Ralph Tuntis’s election and had contributed to Frank Velez’s campaign. All three approved the lease while colleague Luis Muniz abstained.
Mayor Melham had recommended then-Guttenberg Clerk Albert Cabrera to the Township Council to become Town Clerk. Private citizen Melham has sued Cabrera for “insufficient” responding OPRA information.
NUTLEY – Nutley Health Department Township Commissioners took another step forward in making the Nutley Health Department independent by Jan. 1 by hiring Michele O’Reilly here Set. 5.
Health Commissioner John V. Kelly III announced O’Reilly’s appointment that Tuesday night as “For the first time in over two decades, Nutley now has a health officer.”
O’Reilly, until recently, has been Bayonne’s health officer for the last 12 years.
Kelly had given the Montclair Health Department its six months’ advanced notice of leaving their interlocal shared services agreement June 8.
“We’ve previously contracted with other municipalities to use their health officer,” said Kelly. “With the COVID pandemic, it’s just more important than ever that we have our own health officer to really put Nutley first and make sure that Nutley health is a priority.”
