The month is nearly over, and the full crime map showing the areas and levels of crimes in the region can be posted. In the meantime, here’s an overview of the previous week in crime, and some statistics of the crime data so far:
On May 18, four hooded suspects robbed a jewelry store in Hackensack. Two were arrested, the others returned to Brooklyn with the stolen property. Also on that Monday, a 51-year-old inmate at a Newark rehab center was found strangled by two other inmates in a dispute over $20.
On May 19, a Tuesday, a man was arrested for attempted sexual assault on a minor in Ridgefield Park (the hometown of the author) on an internet sting, where he was told to come to a certain location to have sex with a ten-year-old girl. Police arrested him as soon as he got out of his car. Also, a post office in East Orange was robbed at gunpoint.
Wednesday, May 20, had police investigating two shotgun blasts in Irvington, and a gang of gun-toting robbers breaking into a Montclair house, tying up the three occupants, and stealing their wallets as well as possessions in the house.
On Thursday, May 21, a police sting arrested a Parsippany man with 40 loaded pistols, assault rifles, and other weaponry in his house. A few miles east in Paterson that morning, a policeman shot and missed an axe-wielding man who had tried to attack him.
On May 22, two men with Uzi assault rifles robbed a construction boss of $11,000 in cash in downtown Jersey City. Also, two teenagers were carjacked in Paterson, robbed, and left abandoned in northwest. The carjackers were found outside a liquor store an hour later, and were arrested for the carjacking, as well as the twelve baggies of crack cocaine, as well as cannabis and heroin, in their car.
On Saturday, May 23, a young woman claimed to have been raped by two men at the house of Jets’ safety Kerry Rhodes in Morristown. Also, in the early morning of downtown Jersey City, a drive-by shooting critically injured two men. One escaped with a bullet in the leg, but the other was struck six times, in the upper back, stomach, arm, leg, and hand, leaving him in intensive care in the hospital.
On Sunday, May 24, an open air drug market was busted in Jersey City, leading to six men being arrested on drug and illegal weapons charges. Also, a Laundromat owner was stabbed by a homeless man over a small sum of money in Paterson.
In the early morning hours of May 25, a 23-year-old man was fatally shot in the head on a street corner in Jersey City. Later in that day, a Crip in East Orange drew a .38 caliber pistol on his ex-girlfriend and threatened to shoot her in the head; she called the police and he was arrested. He was already facing charges for operating an organized gang of drug distribution all over Essex and Morris Counties.
Since midnight on May 1, there have been:
86 burglaries
33 non-fatal assaults
27 robberies
14 non-fatal shootings
12 stolen vehicles
6 disorderly conducts
6 distribution charges
4 fatal assaults
4 fatal shootings
3 arsons
3 larceny charges
3 sexual assaults
3 weapons offenses
2 lewd acts
1 blackmail
1 breaking and entering
1 carjacking
1 combined distribution and weapons charge
1 manslaughter
1 prostitution charge
In the northernmost six counties of New Jersey. Jersey City clearly appears to be the most dangerous place, with three murders standing out on the list, as well as eleven assaults, two non-fatal shootings, and four armed robberies. Crime has even extended into Bergen and Morris Counties, where robberies, drug distribution, burglaries, and sexual assaults have all shown up on the radar. Sussex County is the only county that’s comparatively quiet. Passaic, Essex, and Hudson are all teeming with crime.
The murders so far have been:
May 5 – Shooting in Newark, man killed with gunshots to chest and head in Vailsburg
May 6 – Stabbing in Paterson, man stabbed multiple times in Wrigley Park
May 6 – Stabbing in Jersey City, man stabbed in his neck and shoulder in Journal Square
May 11 – Shooting in Newark, man killed with gunshot to head in Weequahic
May 17 – Shooting in Newark, man killed with gunshot to chest in Weequahic
May 17 – Strangling in Jersey City, man killed by choking in The Heights
May 18 – Strangling in Newark, man killed by choking in Newark Bay
May 25 – Shooting in Jersey City, man killed with gunshot to the head in Bergen-Lafayette
For some final county data on violent crime before the crime map goes up:
Bergen County has five nonfatal assaults, three robberies.
Essex County has three fatal shootings, five non-fatal shootings, one fatal assault, one non-fatal assault, eleven robberies.
Hudson County has one fatal shooting, two non-fatal shootings, two fatal assaults, sixteen non-fatal assaults, and seven robberies.
Morris County has one non-fatal shooting, five non-fatal assaults, and two robberies.
Passaic County has six non-fatal shootings, one fatal assault, four non-fatal assaults, and three robberies.
Sussex County has two non-fatal assaults and one robbery.
Not a day goes by that I don’t reflect on the human cost behind the numbers. While it’s easy to say that Paterson is doing well compared to Jersey City and Newark in terms of violent crime, the crime that does occur affects real human lives. Each of these shootings, robberies, and burglaries means the world to someone, and it’s something that isn’t spoken to in these cold, hard statistics.
Showing posts with label ridgefield park. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ridgefield park. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Crime and Murder Just Footsteps Away. North Jersey, Summer 2009
When I was a kid I was surprised when my mom told me that people used the motels along 46 in South Hackensack for prostitution and drugs. I always remembered my dad telling me how someone got murdered in the Popeye’s in Teaneck, and the awe I felt that such incredible and dastardly events were taking place minutes from my house. My uncle would impress me with the story of how he and his partner had a gunfight with a Paterson bank robber 1974. The robber had been wounded in the stomach, and my uncle had approached him, and the man had said that it hurt; with all the gravitas of Clint Eastwood, my uncle kicked his balls, and told him that he didn’t hurt nearly enough.
Back then, I imagined all criminals were genius masterminds, all murders were dramatic and cinematic, and all crime breathtaking and exciting. Living by the intersection of routes 80, 46, and 95, ten minutes from New York City, I remember one night the police arrested a man for dumping keys of cocaine out of his car windows on the turnpike in a fit of paranoia. I always remember how my parents would warn me away from certain parks or the movie theater at night, due to people “doing drugs” or fighting; on a walk with my girlfriend when I was 16, we heard some pops, and immediately her mom called us to come back, because some teenagers were firing guns in the air a block from her house.
When people were robbed at gunpoint or had shots fired through their windows near me, I thought I lived in an exciting place. Yeah, I knew New York was dangerous – all the rapes and murders they showed on Eyewitness News convinced me of that – but this was my hometown! This was Paterson, Newark, Englewood, Passaic, Garfield, the places that I lived.
It was all exciting and unreal to me until when I was sixteen, and saw a guy get killed by the police in a terrible circumstance in Las Vegas. He was resisting arrest in a car, and speeding away when he hit a cop on a bicycle, knocking him out. The other cop drew his gun and shot him in the head. Me and my dad were walking on the block, but we didn’t even realize what had happened. The cops began to swarm all around, and got the civilians out of the way, and it wasn’t until later I realized the man had died.
A few days after that, a gang fight broke out at a house party a couple blocks from my house, and a 15-year-old boy who was running away was shot in the back with a .357 and left for dead on the street. His name was Ricky Smith. The Paterson Bloods who had killed him were all arrested, and in the next few months, a recognizance that gang activity existed in Teaneck was much more aware. In the next year, gang members were arrested with loaded guns on streets that I walked on every day, and at the Popeye’s on Teaneck Road, a gang fight resulted in a teenager getting stabbed in the neck, needing 300 stitches to close the wound. Before I left for college, an attempted shooting of a police officer in Little Ferry over the river was the news of the day.
It was this kind of stuff that made criminology one of my biggest interests. Even now, with a more mature and sober outlook on crime, and a much bigger realization of unsafeness, the motivation behind criminals and their actions is something that never ceases to interest me.
When I got to American University, during welcome week we couldn’t go a day without getting a public safety alert of a sex offense or robbery on the roads around American. A casual acquaintance of mine was nearly killed on August 20th, when he was being robbed at gunpoint on Nebraska and Van Ness, and the perpetrator pulled the trigger, only to have the gun jam. In DC, I was much more conscious of high crime areas, and I took this back with me when I went home for breaks.
One night this semester I found a crime map that showed all the crime in DC for the last few years, and I was shocked at the amount of crime in the NW. I didn’t think that the NW had such heavy crime, but this is DC – there were murders and shootings around Tenleytown, people killed in Georgetown, and robberies and knifepoint and gunpoint all around the AU area, and other parts of DC that I frequented. (One of my favorite discoveries was a drunken argument between two homeless men on Constitution Avenue in front of the White House. One of them, who was in a wheelchair, pulled a gun out of his bag and shot the other in the leg…in front of the White House.)
When I looked at crime statistics for my home in New Jersey, I was shocked. Not having paid attention all year to news from back home, I saw killings in Hackensack, drive-by shootings in Lodi, my town having five rapes and five robberies, teenagers being stabbed in gang fights in high school. News reports said that people wouldn’t walk in central Hackensack at night by 1st and Central because drugs were being sold their, and armed robberies kept taking place. Was my home always this dangerous, had I missed it all these years, or was I just more conscious?
I had an idea for this summer to chart all the violent crime in my area, recording it both here and on a Google map. This is not as a scare tactic, but as a sober reminder that this isn’t a problem just for inner cities, and that New Jersey and the places that we live all suffer from crime. My sources will be newspapers, both paper and internet. Because crime spikes in the summer, there will be enough data to have a good look at crime in my area, the places that it occurs, and why it occurs.
This chart and map will cover Bergen County, Passaic County, Essex County, Hudson County, and Morris County. Crimes covered are shootings (fatal and non-fatal), assaults, robberies, and other – including arson, rape, or other high-profile cases that make the news.
May
May 1 – Assault. Man severely beaten, Apartments @ Fremont Street, Jersey City
May 1 – Robbery. Woman robbed of $2500, Tuers and Vroom, Jersey City
May 2 – Assault. Drunken man assaults police officer, diner @ 53rd and Broadway, Bayonne
May 2 – Assault. Bamboozle @ the Meadowlands
May 3 – Assault. Bamboozle @ the Meadowlands
May 3 – Arson. Apartments @ Broad and West Kinney, Newark
May 3 – Shooting. Driver wounded with gunshot to head, Cornelison and Fairmount, Jersey City
May 3 – Shooting. Gas station clerk wounded with gunshot to arm, Broadway and Summer, Paterson
May 4 – Shooting. Police shoot burglar in leg, 16th by South Orange, Newark
May 5 – Shooting. One killed with gunshots to chest and head, one wounded with gunshot to chest, South Orange and Isabella, Newark
Back then, I imagined all criminals were genius masterminds, all murders were dramatic and cinematic, and all crime breathtaking and exciting. Living by the intersection of routes 80, 46, and 95, ten minutes from New York City, I remember one night the police arrested a man for dumping keys of cocaine out of his car windows on the turnpike in a fit of paranoia. I always remember how my parents would warn me away from certain parks or the movie theater at night, due to people “doing drugs” or fighting; on a walk with my girlfriend when I was 16, we heard some pops, and immediately her mom called us to come back, because some teenagers were firing guns in the air a block from her house.
When people were robbed at gunpoint or had shots fired through their windows near me, I thought I lived in an exciting place. Yeah, I knew New York was dangerous – all the rapes and murders they showed on Eyewitness News convinced me of that – but this was my hometown! This was Paterson, Newark, Englewood, Passaic, Garfield, the places that I lived.
It was all exciting and unreal to me until when I was sixteen, and saw a guy get killed by the police in a terrible circumstance in Las Vegas. He was resisting arrest in a car, and speeding away when he hit a cop on a bicycle, knocking him out. The other cop drew his gun and shot him in the head. Me and my dad were walking on the block, but we didn’t even realize what had happened. The cops began to swarm all around, and got the civilians out of the way, and it wasn’t until later I realized the man had died.
A few days after that, a gang fight broke out at a house party a couple blocks from my house, and a 15-year-old boy who was running away was shot in the back with a .357 and left for dead on the street. His name was Ricky Smith. The Paterson Bloods who had killed him were all arrested, and in the next few months, a recognizance that gang activity existed in Teaneck was much more aware. In the next year, gang members were arrested with loaded guns on streets that I walked on every day, and at the Popeye’s on Teaneck Road, a gang fight resulted in a teenager getting stabbed in the neck, needing 300 stitches to close the wound. Before I left for college, an attempted shooting of a police officer in Little Ferry over the river was the news of the day.
It was this kind of stuff that made criminology one of my biggest interests. Even now, with a more mature and sober outlook on crime, and a much bigger realization of unsafeness, the motivation behind criminals and their actions is something that never ceases to interest me.
When I got to American University, during welcome week we couldn’t go a day without getting a public safety alert of a sex offense or robbery on the roads around American. A casual acquaintance of mine was nearly killed on August 20th, when he was being robbed at gunpoint on Nebraska and Van Ness, and the perpetrator pulled the trigger, only to have the gun jam. In DC, I was much more conscious of high crime areas, and I took this back with me when I went home for breaks.
One night this semester I found a crime map that showed all the crime in DC for the last few years, and I was shocked at the amount of crime in the NW. I didn’t think that the NW had such heavy crime, but this is DC – there were murders and shootings around Tenleytown, people killed in Georgetown, and robberies and knifepoint and gunpoint all around the AU area, and other parts of DC that I frequented. (One of my favorite discoveries was a drunken argument between two homeless men on Constitution Avenue in front of the White House. One of them, who was in a wheelchair, pulled a gun out of his bag and shot the other in the leg…in front of the White House.)
When I looked at crime statistics for my home in New Jersey, I was shocked. Not having paid attention all year to news from back home, I saw killings in Hackensack, drive-by shootings in Lodi, my town having five rapes and five robberies, teenagers being stabbed in gang fights in high school. News reports said that people wouldn’t walk in central Hackensack at night by 1st and Central because drugs were being sold their, and armed robberies kept taking place. Was my home always this dangerous, had I missed it all these years, or was I just more conscious?
I had an idea for this summer to chart all the violent crime in my area, recording it both here and on a Google map. This is not as a scare tactic, but as a sober reminder that this isn’t a problem just for inner cities, and that New Jersey and the places that we live all suffer from crime. My sources will be newspapers, both paper and internet. Because crime spikes in the summer, there will be enough data to have a good look at crime in my area, the places that it occurs, and why it occurs.
This chart and map will cover Bergen County, Passaic County, Essex County, Hudson County, and Morris County. Crimes covered are shootings (fatal and non-fatal), assaults, robberies, and other – including arson, rape, or other high-profile cases that make the news.
May
May 1 – Assault. Man severely beaten, Apartments @ Fremont Street, Jersey City
May 1 – Robbery. Woman robbed of $2500, Tuers and Vroom, Jersey City
May 2 – Assault. Drunken man assaults police officer, diner @ 53rd and Broadway, Bayonne
May 2 – Assault. Bamboozle @ the Meadowlands
May 3 – Assault. Bamboozle @ the Meadowlands
May 3 – Arson. Apartments @ Broad and West Kinney, Newark
May 3 – Shooting. Driver wounded with gunshot to head, Cornelison and Fairmount, Jersey City
May 3 – Shooting. Gas station clerk wounded with gunshot to arm, Broadway and Summer, Paterson
May 4 – Shooting. Police shoot burglar in leg, 16th by South Orange, Newark
May 5 – Shooting. One killed with gunshots to chest and head, one wounded with gunshot to chest, South Orange and Isabella, Newark
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