Townwatch by Walter Eliott
NEWARK – Police here and in Brooklyn have been pooling their notes regarding their respectively vandalized George Floyd statues before June 24.
A Newark police squad car, with its service lights on, has been parked almost directly across the seated Floyd statue here at City Hall since June 25. Its posting came after a city cleaning crew had removed paint left on the 700 lb. statue.
An NPD sergeant discovered Floyd’s face spray-painted black and “LIFE … LIBERTY VICTORY PATRIOTFRONT.US” lettered in white across his chest 6 a.m. June 24. The Southern Poverty Law Center and the NYPD have identified Patriot Front as among “white nationalist hate groups.”
News of Floyd’s bust being similarly vandalized at Brooklyn’s Flatbush Avenue Junction at 7:20 a.m. Floyd’s face was also painted black and “PATRIOTFRONT.US” stenciled in white on its base.
Both Stanley Watts and Chris Carnabuci’s respective works were unveiled on or before the June 19 Juneteenth now-federal holiday. Both are intended to be exhibited at other city locations after July 1 or June 18, 2022. Both were defaced the early morning of a Hennepin County, Minn. judge sentencing Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of killing Floyd, to a 22.5-year jail sentence.
They and Philadelphia’s Floyd mural at North 5th and Olney streets June 4 bore Patriot Front lettering or stencils.
NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force has released security camera images of four masked men, one shaking a paint can, walking near the plaza at around 3:30 a.m. NPD, as of press time, has not given a description of its vandal(s).
IRVINGTON – The owners of the 11 cars that had burned in MTS Towing lot here June 17 may have received replies from their insurance carriers by now.
The ECPO Arson Squad, as a standard operating procedure, has been searching for the early-morning fire’s cause once the blaze had been put out.
The first Irvington Fire Department units, responding to a 1:10 a.m. call that Thursday, found several cars afire at 480-500 Chancellor Ave. They pulled two more alarms, the latter bringing several Newark fire units to the scene. The fire was brought under control by 2:30 a.m.
EAST ORANGE – Funeral arrangements for former Councilwoman Sharon Fields have not been released as of press time.
Fields, who had died June 28, was a Fourth Ward Councilwoman for 10 years and a month 2005-15. She was first appointed to fill the resigned Zachary V. Turner’s term in November 2005; (Turner had resigned to serve a sentence on a plea-bargained bribery charge.)
A majority of participating Fourth Ward voters predominantly elected Fields to her first full three-year term in 2007 and re-elected her in 2011. She chose not to run for the 2015 election.
Fields, in her 121 months in office, was Heath and Education Committee Chairwoman and had served on the Public Safety; Arts, Recreation and Cultural Affairs; and Housing, Licensing and Inspection committees. She was also on the city’s parking authority and rent leveling boards of directors.
Prior to making the council dais, Fields was the administrative assistant to the Essex County Juvenile Detention Center Director among other positions in the county’s social services. A City Hall announcement includes work as an aide to then-State Assemblywoman Shelia Y. Oliver, the Newark Board of education, the Seton Hall Law School and, while living in New York, an advertising agency.
“For many years, she was a well-known political activist and community servant,” said the City Hall announcement. “A no-nonsense, outspoken advocate with a heart of gold, the Hon. Sharon Fields will be missed.”
ORANGE – It has become apparent that the 120-year-old building here at the southwest corner of Lincoln and Tremont avenues, regardless of future redevelopment, will be demolished in the near future.
It is to the understanding of “Local Talk” that a city department or board in late May or early June has “authorized” the demolition of the 2.5-story building at 595 Lincoln Ave.
595 Lincoln started life as the Tremont Avenue School in 1901. It became Tremont Middle School by the Orange School District later on until the new Orange High School opened Sept. 1, 1973.
The district, after combining Tremont and Central middle schools into the now-Orange Preparatory Academy/old OHS building, sold the property to the city. Orange’s elders then moved its police department from City Hall’s basement to there.
595 Lincoln served as Orange Police Headquarters until the current Freddie Polhill Law and Justice opened in 2000. The ex-school and ex-police station has been vacant, except for the enveloping ivy, ever since.
The City Council had bought back the property from 595 Lincoln Avenue Urban Renewal LLC on Dec. 1, 2020. The LLC and backer Chadwick Capital had a 2019 redevelopment agreement with Orange where the building would have been replaced by a 4.5-story, 60 market rate unit condominium and integral parking. garage. “Lincoln Avenue Heights” was to open this summer.
Orange’s administrators have since been looking for new developers for it and the former Orange Memorial Hospital site. The hospital property, unlike 595 Lincoln, is a nationally recognized historic district.
WEST ORANGE – What started out as a June 15 bicycle theft call here in the Watchung Heights neighborhood became a new way of going above and beyond the call for 15 West Orange Police Department officers by June 22.
Township spokesman Joseph Fagan said that two WOPD officers had responded to a 12-year-old boy’s report of the strongarm robbery of his bicycle along High Street at 8 p.m. June 15.
Officers took down the boy’s description of the male and female who took away his bike and combed the nine-block street from Washington Street to the Montclair border. It was a matter of time, however, that apprehending the couple and recovering the bicycle was becoming remote.
WOPD Sgt. David Palmere noticed that while the bike owner was physically uninjured, but, in Fagan’s phrasing, “experienced the trauma of having his bicycle taken from under him.”
Palmere and 14 of his colleagues – including a fellow sergeant and a lieutenant – chipped in to buy a replacement bicycle plus a helmet and a lock. They presented them to the victim on or by June 22.
It is not known whether the stolen bicycle was previously registered with its Bike Index preventative program. It is presumed that the bicycle had been entered in WOPD’s Stolen Bike Listings page and Stolen.BikeIndex.org.
SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – A tripled reward fund, a petition to rename the Underhill Sports Complex and questions over the sports complex’s security are among a week of developments related to the search for Moussa Fofana’s killer,
Former Mayor Fred Profeta, on June 27, said that the $10,000 reward first posted by the Essex County Sheriff’s Office CrimeStoppers have exceeded $30,000. Another $10,000 was added since Profeta donated $10,000 of his own June 23.
Those who want to add to the reward fund may either enter Venmo’s @ FredProfeta (donors will be asked for “1108” for a phone number’s last four digits) or make checks payable to Essex County Crimestoppers: “Justice for Moussa.”
Over 5,000 people, as of June 29, have meanwhile signed a petition to have the South Orange-Maplewood School District rename the Underhill complex after Moussa. The Columbia High School Cougars soccer player was killed, and a 17-year-old linebacker wounded by at least one of a group of assailants on that property 9:30 p.m. June 6.
Maplewood Police Chief Jim DeVaul, on June 24, said that Underhill’s gates were unlocked, and its Lynn Profeta Field lights off June 6. DeVaul added that while recommending SOMSD to keep Underhill’s “fence locked” when unused, his officers will patrol that property at the school district’s request.
A second “Justice for Moussa” rally has been set for 6 p.m. June 30 at CHS’s Ritzer Field. The rally will end with a march to Underhill.
BLOOMFIELD – A civil rights attorney has compared three newly released video footage of a Nov. 9 attempted apprehension of an East Orange man and, as of June 22, said he does not like what he saw.
Michael Poreda, Esq., of Somerville, showed News12 New Jersey footage from a police officer’s body camera, another officer’s dashboard camera and from a witnesses’ cell phone. These three clips, first available on the Bloomfield Information Project May 20, were compared to a civilian driver’s 30-second Nov. 10 clip and four Bloomfield Police Department officers’ incident reports.
The combined footage showed three BPD squad cars blocking the path of a Mercedes Benz along Bloomfield Avenue between Orange Road and Sherman Court. The Mercedes, driven by Jeffrey Sutton, 38, of East Orange, had a license plate identifying it as “wanted from East Orange”. The BPD dispatcher, after learning that Sutton had 10 open arrest warrants including one for “aggravated assault,” told responding officers to conduct “a felony traffic stop.”
Four BPD personnel – one uniform officer, a uniform sergeant and two plainclothes officers – approached the car and ordered Sutton out; Three of the officers drew their guns; a fourth tried to smash the driver’s side window with his club.
Sutton, who said he was fearful for his life, refused to obey and slowly backed into a squad car twice. The officers then fired five times, once striking Sutton’s arm. Sutton moved forward and escaped east on Bloomfield into Orange, where he was eventually captured. He was then first taken in custody to Newark’s University Hospital.
The footage showed that Sutton had not backed into the officers, nor had he struck another car – which were in the officers’ reports. Their reports stated that Sutton had accelerated at them and had hit a second car at the scene.
The clips may also show that BPD officers’ actions may violate the department’s own use of force guidelines restricted to the “imminent danger of death or bodily harm” or “no other means are available…to avert or eliminate the danger.”
Sutton remains held in Newark’s Essex County Correctional Facility on two counts of aggravated assault of a law enforcement officer among 17 other charges. Bloomfield Public Safety Director Samuel DeMaio said he “unfortunately” could not comment, given that the investigation is active with the ECPO.
MONTCLAIR – One of Montclair Public Schools has hired a third party to investigate a whistleblower’s accusations of “years-long pattern of employee discrimination and criminal sabotage” during this summer.
“The investigation has started,” said MPS Superintendent of Schools Dr. Jonathan Ponds, at the June 21 Board of Education meeting. “It’ll be a thorough one, including paperwork and interviews.”
Dr. Ponds’ statement followed up his May 17 declaration that the 32-page “To Whom It May Concern” letter submitted by MPS Buildings and Grounds Supervisor Robert H. Kelley IV April 11.
Kelley alleges that MPS custodial staff were subjected to “racist and sexist treatment, bullying and sabotage” meant to undermine employees who supervisors considered disloyal. MPS “employees have lied to state investigators” and “have refused to deal with urgent maintenance issues.”
Kelley asserts that the train of the above events happened from 2018 up to MPS’ April 12 reopening for hybrid learning. The foregoing has led to “students being put at unnecessary risk from asbestos, rodents, extreme cold and heat and other hazards at buildings throughout the district.”
In his letter, elley placed current Buildings and Grounds Director Anthony Bispo and Business Administrator Emidio D’Andrea plus two former employees at the center of his allegations.
Kelley’s letter got the attention of Madison Pubic Schools, which has started its own investigation of its Facilities Director, John Eschmann, May 14. Eschmann was Montclair B&G Director before moving to Madison in August 2020. Madison School Superintendent Mark Schwarz, refraining from commenting on personnel matters, did not say whether Eschmann was placed on leave since May 14.
BELLEVILLE – The Belleville Public Schools has its $1.2 Million Dollar Man in Superintendent Dr. Richjard D. Tomko – and some procedural questions left unanswered – as of July 1.
The Belleville Board of Education Trustees, in a -1-1 split vote on June 21, approved a $1.2 million contract with Dr. Tomko over the next five school years, or $240,000 a year, through June 30, 2026.
Tomko’s fourth contract since his 2015 appointment replaces his July 19, 2019 – June 30, 2024 agreement, where he was paid a base $996,615 over those five school years. His previous salary may have topped out at $1,041,158 had he qualified for a $31,033 merit pay bonus plus $11,010 in high school stipends and a $2,500 stipend towards completing his doctorate.
Why the Trustees and Dr. Tomko agreed to replace his fourth contract two years into its life remains unanswered. Some observers prior to and at the public Belleville High School auditorium had a more immediate question: why was the new contract posted some 20 minutes before the session’s scheduled 7 p.m. start?
Dr. Tomko, at the meeting, told an editor that some contract details were negotiated right up to the last minute. The posted 20-page new contract, however, has a June 16 cover letter from Interim Essex County Superintendent of Schools Joseph Zarra, approving the contract as falling within N.J. Department of Education guidelines.
Dr. Tomko’s contract was approved June 21 with Trustee Frank Velez the sole dissenter and Trustee Luis Muniz being absent.
Tomko, in his BPS website biography, has been credited with filling a $4.2 million deficit early in his seven years’ superintendence and attaining $4 million in state aid for preschool expansion. The Sparta resident was named 2020-21 Essex County Superintendent; BPS, in 2019 was deemed by NJDOE as “A High Performing District.” Tomko meanwhile received his Doctor of Philosophy with Educational Leadership, management and Policy concentration, from Seton Hall.
NUTLEY – The early morning June 24 car rollover on a Route 21 South exit here left its two occupants, one of whom was seriously injured, in custody.
Clifton police, said that city’s Detective Lt. Robert Bracken, alerted their Nutley colleagues of the 2017 Audi A7 they were pursuing on Route 21 into township limits after midnight that Thursday. Its officers said they began chasing the Audi when it had sped away from a Lexington Avenue traffic stop. The luxury sedan’s driver had switched off its lights during the pursuit.
That chase was over a moment later when the A7 clipped a curb on the exit ramp and over-turned. CPD officers captured that man – identified Kashaun Hutson, 24, of Brooklyn — the next moment on a Nutley street. He remains held in Paterson’s Passaic County Jail on eluding, resisting arrest and obstruction.
CPD also arrested its passenger, who was still in the luxury sedan, and called for a Nutley Fire Depart6ment Rescue Squad ambulance. Chester Cherry, 25, of Brooklyn, is to be charged with obstruction when he has been sufficiently held and released from Paterson’s St. Joseph Regional Medical Center.
CPD, said Bracken, was on a DUI enforcement checkpoint when its two officers said they had stopped the Audi on a traffic violation.
