TOWN WATCH
NEWARK – Relatives and friends of an up-and-coming rap artist have been making his funeral arrangements, while authorities search for his killer, since Nov. 8.
Newark police officers, said an Essex County Prosecutor’s Office release, had responded to a report “of a male shot” along the 900 block of South Orange Avenue at 2:40 p.m. Election Day. They found a man, later identified as Nyshon Anthony, 23, with a gunshot wound to his head.
NPD officers called ECPO’s Homicide and Major Crimes Task Force while taping off South Orange Avenue between South Clinton and Brookwood avenues. Buses on NJTransit’s No. 94 and CoachUSA’s No. 31 routes were among the detoured traffic.
Anthony was rushed to Newark’s University Hospital, where he was declared dead at 2:07 p.m. Nov. 9.
Anthony was also known by his “GunHead” rap name. RIP messages have been posted under his “Jack Sum” and “Second Stream” videos posted on YouTube earlier this year.
IRVINGTON / SOUTH ORANGE / MAPLEWOOD – Municipal elders and health officials have until Jan. 1 to find animal control and shelter services in the wake of St. Hubert’s Animal Welfare’s withdrawal.
St. Hubert’s, of Madison, informed health officers here and 16 other state municipalities Oct. 22 that it will let its contracts with them lapse on New Year’s Day. An official said that a decline of donations has come to where they were spending $2 in services for every $1 it receives.
The announcement came before Irvington.net had posted a help wanted ad for a health officer on Nov. 14. This township is being served by Maya Lordo, who is Essex County and Essex County College’s health officer. The candidate search is not to affect Irvington’s hunt for a St. Hubert’s successor.
South Orange and Maplewood are meanwhile looking at “all options,” including re-opening the former Jersey Animal Coalition shelter at 298 Walton Ave., South Orange. JAC, which was serving “SOMA” since 1989, closed on Nov. 11, 2014.
The Village of South Orange currently uses 298 Walton for offices. It had awarded a short-term lease in 2016 to the Run Jump Lift fitness center.
Other options for all three “Local Talk” towns include shared service agreements with the East Orange Animal Shelter, the West Orange Animal Shelter, the Montclair Animal Shelter and/or Newark animal shelter operator Associated Humane Society. Bloomfield also has its Bukowski Animal Shelter.
EAST ORANGE – Friends and relatives of Rahem Ross Brown, better known as the rapper “Tame One” or “Tamer Dizzle,” held a funeral for him at Newark’s Perry Funeral Home Nov. 15. Brown, 52, who has East Orange and Newark ties, died from heart failure Nov. 6.
Mother Darlene Brown Harris said that a medical examiner told her that Brown had “six pharmaceutical drugs that Trinitas Hospital had prescribed him last Friday (Nov. 4), combined with the weed he smoked over the weekend – his heart gave out.”
Brown, who was born March 20, 1970, had attended East Orange’s Bernie L. Edmonson School before going to Newark’s Vailsburg High School. As Tame One, he was cofounder of The Artifacts (of the 1990s), Boomskwad, Leak Bros and The Weathermen. He released a solo EP, Skwadzilla, in 2015.
Some may recall Tame One’s tag as much as his recording of “Wrong Side of Da Tracks.” Brown was a graffiti writer and a supporter of the New York area graffiti scene. The Artifacts had released “No Expiration Date” in August.
Fire Displaces 18
City and county fire marshals are investigating what caused a fire to break out at 75-81 North Arlington Ave. early Nov. 14. The blaze damaged the garden apartment building’s 16 units and forced 18 residents to temporary housing.
The first responding EOFD units found fire coming from one of the building’s third floor apartments at 2:17 a.m. Monday. The incident commander on scene called for an “all hands” second alarm and an evacuation. The fire was brought under control by 2:45 a.m.
ORANGE – City and county law enforcers have been searching for the suspect who took a car in front of a Scotland Road day care center during Nov. 14’s evening rush hour – with an infant inside – and abandoned them on a South Ward street minutes later.
Orange Public Safety Director Todd Warren and Acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore “Ted” Stephens II said that city police officers had responded to a “carjacking in progress” report from 237 Scotland Rd, at 5:35 p.m. Monday.
They were met in front of Blessed Hope Daycare “by a frantic woman,” who said that someone had taken her late model Hyundai Elantra with her 8-month-old child in the back seat. OPD officers launched a search, starting with the Hyundai’s apparent southern direction on Scotland.
Essex County Sheriff Armando Fontoura said that one of his officers joined the canvassing after learning of Orange’s all points bulletin. The sheriff’s officer found the car, with the child still inside, abandoned on Conover Terrace between Scotland and Lincoln Avenue, .2 mile south.
Witnesses told the sheriff’s officer and 12 arriving Orange officers that a male had stopped the car in the middle of the street and had bailed out. The infant, who was checked by St. Clare’s Hospital EMS technicians, was found unharmed and released to the father.
One report had the Elantra being stolen while it was still unlocked and idling. No weapon was shown or used during the theft. Other details are pending as of press time.
The said day care center building started life in the 1970s as an indoor pistol target range.
WEST ORANGE – It took five days after Nov. 8, but township native Mark Kelly was effectively re-elected as one of Arizona’s two U.S. Senators Nov. 12.
A majority of Arizonian voters granted the retired fighter pilot and NASA astronaut his first full six-year term over Republican challenger Blake Masters. Kelly (D-Tucson) collected 1,300,471 for 51.4 percent with 98 percent of that state’s polling districts reporting.
Masters (R-Tucson) mustered 1,174,755 for 46.5 percent. The venture capitalist had said that he would not concede “until every vote is counted.”
Kelly was first elected US Senator over incumbent Martha McSally, 51.2 percent over 48.8 percent, in a Nov. 3, 2020 special election. Sen. McSally (R-Sun City West) was appointed to succeed John McCain, who died in office in 2018.
Kelly entered public service and politics in 2018 in the wake of his wife’s shooting. Then-Cong. Gabby Giffords was among 13 people injured by a shooter, who killed six others, during a Tucson area mall meet-and-greet Jan. 8, 2011. Giffords resigned from Congress in 2012.
Mark and twin brother Scott Kelly – who were born in Orange’s St. Mary’s Hospital Feb. 21, 1964 – were raised in this township’s Pleasantdale section. Their Pleasantdale elementary school was renamed in their honor in 2016.
The Kelly brothers, Mountain High School Class of 1982, moved to the Sun Belt to pursue their US Navy and NASA careers. Mark, who has four Space Shuttle and International Space Station flights to his name, may be best known as the earthbound “control subject” while Scott spent a year on the ISS 2015-16.
BLOOMFIELD – Testimony over traffic at the former Friendly’s on Broad Street, based on what was heard before the Bloomfield Planning Board Nov. 9, will most likely take up the bulk of the board’s Dec. 6 session.
Applicant Finomus Bloomfield Re Holdings, who wants to replace the closed Friendly’s at 1243 Broad St. with a combined Taco Bell/Wendy’s, brought a new traffic analysis before township planners and the public Nov. 9. Traffic engineer John Corak presented projected vehicular traffic data where customers’ peak period would not interfere with Brookdale Elementary School’s afternoon dismissal across the street.
Corak’s projected peak period of 90 customers, however, brought concerns from township officials. The 90, who would be getting advance-ordered food from a pickup window, said several board members, may overwhelm the site’s intended 29 parking spaces.
Bloomfield Fire Prevention Subcode Official Vincent Colavitti said that the eatery’s northbound traffic at that time would spill back across the Bloomfield fire station next door. Mark Leber, the applicant’s engineer, said that the spillback came from the timing of the traffic light at Broad Street and West Passaic Avenue.
The would-be Taco Bell and Wendy’s are drawn without a drive-through window – which is banned in the site’s zoning. Some board members and via Zoom residents wondered, however, whether the intended pickup window is a “stealth” drive-through portal.
Several speakers asked whether customers arriving from southbound Broad Street would use residential streets like Mountain Avenue or Overlook Terrace to “loop around” in peak hours.
GLEN RIDGE – The Glen Ridge Board of Education appointed a new board member on Nov. 9 on a temporary basis until Jan. 4. The board member who the temporary member had replaced will be back on Jan. 4 for her re-inauguration.
Dr. Heather Yaros-Ramos, despite having an inactive campaign since Oct. 1, received Nov. 8’s second-highest vote total. Neither Dr. Yaros-Ramos nor Glen Ridge Public Schools would say why she had to take temporary leave.
Yaros-Ramos’ three-month absence, however, prompted a search for her temporary successor. The board appointed Erica Spayd, AIA. Spayd is a licensed architect who specializes in interior store design.
Spayd’s time as a school board member, however, will come and go in an institutional eyeblink.
Yaros-Ramos will rejoin current Board President Elisabeth Ginsburg and will welcome newcomer Tricia Akinwande when all three are sworn into their offices Jan. 4. All three received the borough’s unique Civic Conference Committee endorsement for the fall election.
MONTCLAIR – Nov. 8’s Board of Education election and schools construction bond issue referendum results remain unchanged as of press time – although its number have.
Essex County Clerk Chris Durkin updated the $187.7 million bonding question and the four Montclair BOE member candidates’ figures on essexclerk.com 2 p.m. Nov. 11. The addition came from delays in receiving and counting votes from voting machines in two of the township’s polling station districts.
Election workers in Midtown’s Ward 2, District 2 and the South End’s Ward 4, District 9 had failed to retrieve the machine’s electronic modules and bring them back to Durkin’s Election Division Office in Newark Nov. 8. Durkin was granted permission from a State Superior Court-Newark judge Nov. 9 to access the State Police-impounded machines and recover the modules Nov. 10.
Nov. 8’s vote was historic in that Montclairans, for the first time, had a direct say in who gets MBOE’s three three-year terms and on a school spending question. Montclair Public Schools are in the three-year process of converting its mayor-appointed board to an elected one.
The three-year school construction bond issue question was still carried by Montclair voters. There are now 11,286 “Yes” votes or 83.97 percent and 2,154 “No” votes or 16.03.
Candidates Yvonne Bourknight, Mfeke “Monk” Inyang and Brian Fleschier remain headed for a Jan. 1 swearing-in. Second-time candidate Bourknight is still top vote-getter at 9,350 or 30.40.
First-time runner Fleischer remains second at 7,885 or 25.64. Incumbent Inyang gets his first full three-year term at 6,974 or 22.67. Noah Gale completed the balloted field at 6,549 or 21.29.
BELLEVILLE – A 19-year Belleville Police patrolman and his lawyer have filed a 42-page civil complaint against the department and the township, charging “harassment and retaliation,” in State Superior Court-Newark Oct. 19.
Off. Chad Alesandrelli filed his 42-page complaint while he is finishing a 180-day suspension without pay that the BPD began on May 30. A hearing officer permitted the suspension for operating a car with expired registration but had overturned departmental charges of leaving home on a sick day and giving “misleading information on his whereabouts after his shift had ended.”
Alesandrelli said that the suspension was harsh in comparison to the 15 days given to other department members. The suspension, furthermore, is the latest in a train of “harassment, punishment and demeaning” since he had reported a work injury going back to 2018 and a 2020 COVID-19 diagnosis.
Alesandrelli said that he had applied for workers compensation for knee surgery incurred while he was chasing a suspect. He was then accused by his supervisors of taking a vacation in Costa Rica while recovering. An internal affairs investigation had cleared him of that charge.
The officer said that he had tested positive for COVID, incurring blurred vision, in December 2020. Alesandrelli said that a supervisor had arranged a three-way call with his doctor to confirm the diagnosis and, daily thereafter, called the officer of his health and vision.
BPD Internal Affairs began a sick pay investigation in 2021 on Alesandrelli after an orthopedist had found severe spinal degeneration. That probe resulted in their levying charges of insubordination, providing false information and neglect of duty that December.
Belleville Town Manager Anthony Iacono, when called by a reporter Nov. 11, said he could not discuss details of the lawsuit.
NUTLEY – What the Nutley Police Department called “a situation at Ernest Street and Mecham Street” Nov. 9 closed several streets and put several residences and schools in lockdown that Wednesday morning.
People had just started their morning work and school routines near the Belleville border when NPD officers put out a “secure in place” order for Lincoln Elementary and Holy Family Day Nursery schools by 9 a.m.
Residents along Entwistle Avenue, said NPD Lt. Anthony Montinari, “were evacuated to a temporary safe area.” That evacuation included officers banging on residents’ doors. “Members of other agencies” were meanwhile called to the residential corner.
Police Chief Thomas Strumolo and Public Safety Commissioner Alphonse Petracco, at 9:43 a.m., announced “that the incident on Meacham Street has been safely resolved” and lifted the lockdowns. They added that the incident was “isolated.”
Exactly what the incident was that merited the lockdowns and closings remain unelaborated as of press time.
