Town Watch by Walter Elliott
NEWARK – Predawn motorists who use the McCarter Highway part of NJ Route 21 were subjected to predawn delays in the area of Third Avenue Aug. 6 while an overturned tractor-trailer truck there was uprighted and towed away.
A Newark Police Division Traffic Bureau report states that the southbound truck, owned by the Frito-Lay Corp., had lost control while running south on 21 and crossing the Third Avenue intersection at about 4:30 a.m. that Friday.
The truck, in the report, felled a light pole alongside the Exxon Tiger Mart at 1437 McCarter Hwy. and crossed into the highway’s northbound lanes. The vehicle flipped onto its passenger side at the Conoco station at 1434 McCarter.
The truck driver, who got out through the cab’s passenger door, was not seriously injured. Nor was the driver of a silver four-door car seriously injured after NPD said was struck either by the pole or the truck while at the Exxon station.
The station at 1434 McCarter had recently switched from the Gulf Oil brand to Conoco. The Continental Oil Company was a Midwestern brand until it and Phillips 66 merged in 2002. ConocoPhillips then entered or re-entered the East Coast market.
It is not known whether the Frito-Lay truck was making a local delivery. The truck, which carried a trailer-sized Doritos banner may have reminded passing drivers of comedian-pitch man Jay Leno’s 1990s line: “Crunch all you want; we’ll make more!”
IRVINGTON – Police officers here and from Newark converged at their respective North Ward and Vailsburg section borders in response to a shooting report Aug. 4.
Officers found an “unconscious but breathing” man in Vailsburg Park, across Oraton Parkway from 106 South Devine Street 1:15 p.m. that Wednesday with a serious gunshot wound to the head. The victim was rushed to Newark’s University Hospital.
NPD, however, took the investigatory lead. The Essex County park and 106 So. Devine St. are a half-block north of the Irvington border. Southbound Devine and Oraton Parkway leads into the Garden State Parkway’s Exit 144 toll gate and Irvington’s Myrtle Avenue.
EAST ORANGE – A virtual funeral service for retired judge Sherry A. Hutchins-Henderson followed a 9 a.m. walk-through visitation here at Orange’s St. Matthew AME Church, her home house of worship, Aug. 11.
Hutchins-Henderson, 62, a city native who was a New Jersey Superior Court-Newark judge for the last 15 years, died Aug. 4. Her 2006 appointment by Gov. Richard Codey and 2013 tenure confirmation peaked a four-decade law career. She and husband Dr. Eugene Henderson, a higher education consultant, retired to West Orange in 2018.
Sherry Hutchins, Clifford J. Scott High School Class of 1977, attained a BA in business administration from Rutgers in 1981 and her Juris Doctorate from the Howard University School of Law in 1984. She was admitted to the New Jersey and Pennsylvania bar associations in 1984 and in Michigan in 1988.
Hutchins first worked as a legal advisor for the US Securities and Exchange Commission in 1984 before becoming vice president at Michigan National Corporation’s legal department in 1988. She worked from Newark as an assistant attorney in the U.S. Attorney’s Office-New Jersey District’s criminal division 1992-2006.
Hutchins married Henderson in 1994 and raised Jena Marie Henderson and Halima Henderson. Hutchins-Henderson contributed to the East Orange School District mentoring program, the Girl Scout Council of Greater Essex and Hudson Counties, the National Black Prosecutors Association and the Association of Black Women Lawyers, among other organizations. She was an East Orange Hall of Fame 2019 Inductee-Enterprise Category.
Sisters Pamela Davis-Duck, Pandora N. Hutchins, Dr. Sonja Hutchins-Eke and Ivy Hutchins-Best are also among her survivors. Parents John and Winnie Hutchins, Deacon and Deaconess of Orange’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, predeceased her.
ORANGE – A majority of the City Council – after six months of taking public comment and bill tabling – has banned the establishment of Cannabis-Based Businesses for the next five years Aug. 4. Their 5-2 split vote on the ordinance, pending Mayor Dwayne Warren’s signature on or by Aug. 24, will align Orange with Glen Ridge and Nutley as “no-CBB towns” in Local Talk territory.
Ordinance 14-2021, sponsored by North Ward Councilwoman Tency Eason since its March 16 introduction, was carried by Eason, East Ward Councilman/Council President Kerry Coley, West Ward Councilman Harold Johnson, Jr., and at-large councilmen Clifford Ross and Wheldon “Monty” Montague III at about 9:25 p.m. that Wednesday.
Their passage was made before an estimated Council Chamber audience of 20 and an Orange TV/YouTube livestream. Orange TV’s Zoom function was down, leaving the public to comment either in writing in advance or by personally attending the meeting.
Coley, speaking for “the majority of the Council,” said that Orange’s elders had some uncertainties about the state’s establishment of CBB regulations. Temporarily banning CBBs into 2026, he reasoned, would give them more time to research the matter.
All municipalities statewide had 180 days from Gov. Murphy’s Feb. 22 CBB establishment bill signing to get back to the state to allow (whole or in part) or ban CBBs. Orange Law Department Attorney Avram White, filling in for City Attorney Gracia Montilus, said that the state would impose the six CBB classes on towns that do not decide by Aug. 22 – but leave them with licensing power.
“The Mayor, at a May 5 Open House (on CBBs) said he would send a revised ordinance; the City Clerk didn’t receive it until June 15,” said Coley. “A majority of the Council sent the Mayor a list of questions; to this day, we’ve had no reply. Absent of the input from the Administration, a majority of the Council has come to the end of the road and will vote for the ordinance.”
“By a ‘majority of the Council,’ did you include us?” asked Councilwoman Adrienne Wooten, who also spoke for South Ward Councilwoman Jamie Summers-Johnson. “We weren’t included. Just like with the Municipal Budget, this (Ord. 14-2021) is our document. Our job is to legislate – not the (Mayor’s) Administration.
Wooten and Summers-Johnson, who held two CBB open houses, voted against the 2021-26 CBB ban bill.
WEST ORANGE – A Funeral Mass for lifelong township resident Craig Waldron, Jr., 30, was held in Verona’s Our Lady of the Lake Church Aug. 2.
Waldron was identified by the State Regional Medical Examiner as the driver of the GMC SUV that had gone off the Garden State Parkway and crashed in Bloomfield July 27.
A New Jersey State Police-Bloomfield Barracks spokesman said that the car was heading north on the GSP when it veered left into a wooded area of the center median by milepost 153.7 at 11:15 a.m. July 27.
The vehicle slammed into several trees while going down an embankment, entrapping the driver and causing a fire. Bloomfield Fire Department and local EMS helped with the closing of two northbound left lanes, the extinguishment, and the recovery. Northbound traffic was backed out 3.5 miles out to Exit 150 – Hoover Avenue, Bloomfield.
Waldron, who was born Feb. 24, 1991, was a West Orange High School Class of 2009 graduate who parlayed his 2014 broadcast journalism degree from Penn State University into a profession in pharmaceutical sales. He had worked with Curative Laps December 2020-March 2021 in scaling up their COVID-19 testing program– and went to his last job, with Exact Sciences.
“C.J.,” a passionate golfer and NY Giants fan, is survived by parents Craig T. and Kathleen Waldron, grandfathers Dr. Robert J. Waldron and Frank Rauschenberger, sister Paige and brother Jake. Memorial donations may be made to Penn State’s thon.org/take-action.
SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – A Funeral Mass to remember and celebrate the life of David Codey Durkin was held at the village’s Our Lady of Sorrows R.C. Church July 31 – where a similar Mass was held for father Raymond M. Durkin in 2014.
Durkin, 50 who died in his Florham Park home July 27, worked the last 18 years as a longshoreman for APM Terminals of Elizabeth. South Orange-Maplewood locals, however, remember “Super Dave” or “D-Man” for his Columbia High School athletics.
Durkin was born Dec. 5, 1970 in Orange’s St. Mary’s Hospital – and into the Codey-Durkin family of Essex County public servants or politicians.
Father Raymond M. was chairman on the county and state Democratic committees. Brother Christopher would become Essex County Clerk. Gov. Richard Codey was his godfather.
David grew up with Raymond M. and mother Joan Codey Durkin plus brothers Christopher, Raymond, Jr. and Timothy and sister Maureen in Maplewood and went to CHS. The Cougars basketball player particularly excelled in lacrosse, earning All-American honors in his senior year. The CHS Class of 1989 graduate continued to set lacrosse records while at Montclair State University.
Wife Allyson Rhatican Durkin, sons Jack and Ryan and daughters Elizabeth and Claire are also among the ILA Local 1804-1 member’s survivors. Funeral arrangements, including a private cremation, were arranged by Codey-Jones, of Caldwell.
Memorial donations may be made to: Seton Hall Prep’s “Brendan P. Tevlin ’13 Memorial Field Fund, 120 Northfield Ave., West Orange; and/or the Good Vibes & Easy Living Foundation, 25 Lombard Dr., W. Caldwell 07006.
BLOOMFIELD – The report of a township teenager’s May 17 sexual assault became public knowledge in a Paterson courtroom after a State Superior Court judge granted an Aug. 3 pretrial detention of a Passaic man.
Judge Marilyn C. Clark granted the Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office request to continue holding Eloy Tomay Coyotl, 32, of Passaic in that county’s jail without bail until his trial.
Coyotl is accused of pulling the teen into his vehicle while both were on a Bloomfield street May 17. The victim told Bloomfield and Passaic police and PCPO attorneys that Coyotl drove into Passaic – where he committed the sexual assault while in the vehicle.
Bloomfield officers joined their Passaic city colleagues in interviewing the victim and witnesses. The PCPO took the investigation’s lead since the sexual assault took place in their jurisdiction. Coyotl, said Passaic County Prosecutor Camelia and Passaic Police Chief Luis Guzman, was arrested without incident July 30.
Cotoyl was charged on a count each of luring, kidnapping, criminal restraint at risk of serious bodily injury to the victim, endangering the welfare of a child with sexual contact, criminal sexual contact, aggravated criminal sexual contact and sexual assault through force or coercion.
Anyone who has any information on the May 17 incident or any other incidents involving the suspect are to call 1(877) 370-PCPO.
MONTCLAIR – Funeral arrangements for longtime township resident Dennis Thomas, better known as Kool & the Gang’s “Dee Tee” or “D.T.,” have not been announced as of press time.
Thomas, 70, said a spokesman for the family and the band, had died here at home in his sleep.
Thomas, who was born Feb. 9, 1951 in Orlando before his family first moved to Jersey City. Thomas and six Lincoln High School friends founded what became Kool & the Gang – as the Jazziacs – in 1964. The jazz/R&B group had played as the New Dimensions and Soul Town Review before naming themselves after Robert “Kool” Bell in 1969.
Thomas’ contribution to the band was manifold. The alto saxophonist, percussionist and flutist also doubled on sets as the group’s master of ceremonies. The band’s “budget hawk,” carrying the night’s proceeds in a paper bag stuffed into his horn was also its wardrobe manager.
Kool & the Gang, with its blend of jazz, R&B, Brazilian fusion and other influences, scored a series of award-winning pop hits 1978-86, including, “Celebration,” “Get Down on It” and “Ladies Night.” Royalties continued afterward through hip-hop sampling and Hollywood soundtracks.
Thomas, who the band called “the quintessential cool cat of the group, loved for his trendy clothes and hats and laid-back demeanor,” last performed with them July 4 at the Hollywood Bowl.
Wife Phynjuar, daughter Tuesday, sons David and Devin, brother Bill and sisters Doris and Elizabeth are among his survivors.
