ONLY ON CVP: A woman declined hospitalization after her sedan clipped a telephone pole, barreled across a Lodi front lawn and slammed into an SUV parked in a driveway tonight.
The driver told emergency responders that she hit accelerator instead of the brake on Union Street.
Moonachie First Aid & Rescue Squad treated her for a minor injury.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
SHOUT OUT: One of two New Jersey centers to help citizens enroll for coverage under the federal Affordable Care Act opened in Cliffside Park yesterday.
Assistance is free and bilingual representatives are available at the centers, operated by SRA International, which provides IT solutions and professional services to government organizations.
Hours are 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday at the Cliffside Park center at 596 Anderson Avenue (see map, below).
You can schedule an appointment or walk in.
PHONE: (201) 414-0465
Email: enroll_njnorth@sra.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/enrollnorthernnj
Twitter: @NJNorth_EAC
The center has 52 “assisters” fluent in no fewer than 13 languages and certified to answer questions, address concerns and help enroll citizens in qualified health plans through Healthcare.
The Enrollment Assistance Centers are operated under contract with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Open enrollment for government-sponsored healthcare runs through Feb. 15, but you must be enrolled by Dec. 15 to have coverage effective Jan. 1.
Attending yesterday’s grand opening of the Cliffside Park center were U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, HHS Regional DIrector Jackie Cornell-Becelli, Chaim Lazarus of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, borough Council President Thomas Calabrese and Council members Donna Spotto, Bernie Fontana and Larry Bongard, among others.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Thanks to surveillance images posted online, Hackensack police have charged two men with robbery for double-dooring an Applebee’s restaurant and then clipping the manager in the parking lot with their Cadillac Escalade as they fled.
Keith Koeppel, 56, of Lodi was arrested at his home by city police and remained held on $250,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail after a viewer recognized the North Bergen native in a story posted about the Oct. 14 incident.
Michael Comas, 23, of Cliffside Park was picked up by at his girlfriend’s house in Stamford, where he was being held on a fugitive warrant pending extradition to New Jersey, Detective Capt. Thomas Salcedo told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this morning.
The car was seized, he said.
The manager, who refused medical attention after being hit by the pickup, told police that the pair spoke to one another in English and Hebrew after coming to the Hackensack Avenue restaurant just off westbound Route 4 around 8 o’clock that night.
SURVEILLANCE IMAGES: Courtesy HACKENSACK PD
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A Teaneck man arrested on burglary charges plotted an unsuccessful scheme from his jail cell to have one of his co-defendants killed, Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said this afternoon.
Detectives from Molinelli’s office have charged WIlliam “Christopher” Collins, 41, with conspiracy to commit murder, the prosecutor said.
Collins was one of four men and a 17-year-old boy taken into custody last December by a multi-jurisdictional task force consisting of detectives from the Special Investigation Squad of the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office, the Bergen County Sheriff’s Office and several Bergen County municipal police departments in connection with a series of local burglaries, Molinelli (above, right) said this afternoon.
Four months ago, his detectives got a tip that Collins was plotting to kill one of his co-defendants before the case could go to trial, the prosecutor said.
Additional charges were expected, he said.
MUGSHOT: Courtesy BERGEN COUNTY PROSECUTOR
Two Ramapo College students are charged with raping a female student and videotaping a portion of it, authorities said today.
Christian A. Lopez, 24, of Secaucus, and 18-year-old Nakeem D. Gardner of Paterson and were being held on $300,000 bail each in the Bergen County Jail, charged with aggravated sexual assault.
Gardner also is charged with invasion of privacy for taking video and photos of the woman without her consent.
The woman told investigators she’d attended an overnight fraternity party, went to lie down after not feeling well and woke up the next day partially clothed in an on-campus dormitory room, sources with direct knowledge of the investigation told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
She then went to Hackensack University Medical Center, whose personnel notified authorities, Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said this afternoon.
Investigators from the prosecutor’s office and Mahwah police interviewed the girl, as well as several students, before bringing both men in for questioning late yesterday, he said.
“A review of video surveillance on campus as well as interviews of numerous students resulted in detectives identifying two suspects and confirming that the victim was highly intoxicated and unable to consent to sexual activity,” Molinelli said.
Detectives arrested Gonzalez on campus and Lopez at his home.
Ramapo President Peter P. Mercer addressed the situation on the college’s Facebook page: “The safety and well-being of our students remains our paramount concern. Therefore, while we believe our sexual assault prevention programming and procedures are strong, the shocking nature of these allegations compels us to re-examine them.”
Mercer pledged to seek an expert’s assessement “to ensure Ramapo College is at the forefront of sexual assault prevention and alcohol awareness education.”
MUGSHOTS: Courtesy BERGEN COUNTY PROSECUTOR
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Authorities have charged a 32-year-old Dumont man with having “inappropriate sexual activity” with an Elmwood Park girl over the course of a decade, beginning when she was five and he was 10.
David C. Polkowski, 32, who is single and unemployed, was being held on $200,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail.
Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said the woman, who has since moved out of New Jersey, is now 27 years old — which means the alleged assaults began in 1992 and ended in 2002.
Polkowski was charged with aggravated sexual assault and child endangerment after being arrested yesterday by members of Molinelli’s Special Victims Unit and Elmwood Park police.
“The victim recently contacted the Elmwood Park Police Department and reported to them what had occurred,” the prosecutor said late this afternoon.
“They contacted the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office Special Victims Unit and a detective from that Unit along with a detective from the Elmwood Park Police Department subsequently interviewed the victim,” Molinelli said. “She described to them in greater detail what had occurred, and the ensuing investigation resulted in [his] arrest.”
MUGSHOT: Courtesy BERGEN COUNTY PROSECUTOR
PHOTO/INSET: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Correspondent Richard Criscione, TOP: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Correspondent Damien Danis
AFTERMATH: A windswept fire blew through five interconnected four-story condominium buildings under construction in Cliffside Park tonight, blowing embers that ignited a second blaze that destroyed the upper half of a three-story apartment building two blocks away and forced a neighborhood evacuation.
No immediate serious injuries were reported, although a Palisade Avenue resident possibly suffered a heart attack and at least one firefighter was treated for smoke inhalation.
An extensive overhaul was under way tonight, following a chain reaction of events that brought firefighters from no fewer than eight other Bergen towns, along with North Hudson Regional Fire and Rescue.
“Despite a logistical nightmare of sub-freezing temperatures, brutal wind blowing the fire right at them and electrical wires right above them, Cliffside firefighters began putting water on the fire within minutes and kept an even larger tragedy from occurring,” said borough resident Richard Criscione, a CLIFFVIEW PILOT correspondent.
Borough firefighters were battling flames that roared on the former site of Marburn Warehouse at Walker Street and Cliff Lane when flying embers ignited the second blaze on the roof and cockoft of the Palisade Avenue building.
Embers hit other buildings on Walker and at least one more on Palisade, as well, along with some utility poles and vehicles, emergency responders at the scene said.
Those evacuated were taken to the senior center on Gorge Road, they said. There were no immediate indications Wednesday morning of how many were left homeless.
The cause was being investigated by borough fire officials and the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Arson Investigations Unit — standard procedure when the cause isn’t instantly known.
Multiple sources told CLIFFVIEW PILOT they heard at least three loud blasts — possibly propane tanks exploding — from the upper floors of the Walker Street building around 5:30 p.m.
The fire quickly went to three alarms, and by 7:30 the roof was gone.
Firefighters from Bogota, Englewood Cliffs, Fort Lee, Hackensack Leonia, Little Ferry, Palisades Park and Teaneck responded to the scenes or as standby mutual aid.
DPW crews spread salt to keep runoff from turning slick in the frigid night.
VIDEO by Alan Sikiric (via North Jerzy Fire Alerts)
PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Correspondent Damien Danis
PHOTO: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Correspondent Damien Danis
PHOTO: Werner R. Ennesser
PHOTO: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Correspondent Kevin Teel
PHOTO: Cathy Kerr Tolomeo
PHOTO: Richard Criscione
PHOTO: Edwin Trejo
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Ridgewood police yesterday disarmed and subdued a troubled 55-year-old man who they said pulled a knife on them.
Officers called to Chestnut Street found James Brown in need of psychiatric evaluation, Police Chief John Ward said this morning.
Although he “initially calmed down and state that he would go to the hospital, Mr. Brown suddenly pulled out a knife and a brief struggle ensued,” Ward said.
The officers quickly snatched the weapon from him, after which Brown was taken to Bergen Regional Medical Center, the chief said.
He remained there this morning under guard of the Bergen County Sheriff’s Office, charged with aggravated assault on a police officer, resisting arrest and weapons offenses.
The officers received minor injuries, Ward said.
“It’s a testament to the caliber of officers we have and the training they receive,” the chief told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Two heroin addicts who stole a desktop PC were busted by a Wallington police detective after hocking it for $40, authorities said this morning.
The 18-year-old Halston Avenue victim said he told Krzysztof Latocha (above, left) and Adam Jaworski (above, right), both 22, that he was going on a cruise.
When he got back, the $700 computer was gone, Detective Lt. Shawn Kudlacik said.
Kudlacik contacted Saddle Brook detectives and got an itemized spreadsheet of sales from a popular pawn shop in their town.
“First we brought in Jaworski, then we brought in Latocha,” he told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
Latocha, the alleged getaway driver, apparently gave Jaworski a sweatshirt that he told him to turn inside out and directed him to fetch a laptop from the apartment, the lieutenant said.
He came back with the tower instead.
Latocha remained held on $5,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail following his arrest Monday. Jaworski was released on his own recognizance.
MUGSHOT: Courtesy WALLINGTON PD
HAVE YOU SEEN HIM? His name is Marian Kolodziej, he’s 61 years old, he speaks no English and he was last seen in Passaic.
Kolodziej was wearing a three-quarter-length black coat, gray slacks and a dark dress shirt when his image was caught on security cameras at the Sports Bar Inn on the corner of 8th and South streets at 1 a.m. Sunday.
He had no phone or identification with him and has no known health issues, authorities said.
If you see Kolodziej or know where to find him, please call Wallington PD: (973) 473-1715
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A Fair Lawn police detective cracked four residential burglaries from yesterday with the quick arrest of a former borough man.
Detective Paul Donohue took 18-year-old Jaren Cooney of West Milford into custody following yesterday’s break-ins, which occurred between 4-7 p.m. on Ryder Road, Warren Road, Southern Drive and East Amsterdam Avenue.
The Fair Lawn High School graduate “confessed to driving around the borough, looking for homes with no lights on and no vehicles in their driveways to enter so that he could obtain prescription medications,” Sgt. Brian Metzler said this morning.
“Entry was either gained or attempted through a rear door or window,” Metzler said. “No proceeds were taken at all of the reported burglaries.”
Police released Cooney without bail pending a Municipal Court hearing on two counts of burglary, two of attempted burglary and two of criminal mischief.
STORY/PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Senior Correspondent Boyd A. Loving
UPDATE: A gas leak caused when a contractor accidentally cut two lines closed the A&P shopping center on Pascack Road and cleared the nearby publc library in Washington Township early this afternoon.
Stores were evacuated as township police, firefighters and EMS workers responded around 12:30 p.m.
A construction company digging a trench behind the Dunkin Donuts “completely cut” two 1½-inch gas lines, Washington Township Fire Chief William Bilias told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
A Bergen County Hazardous Materials unit happened to be at the center and assisted Bilias’s firefighters in checking stores for gas and possible injuries.
At least one person initially required attention, at the bagel shop in the shopping center.
A PSE&G crew allowed staff and customers to return just after 1 p.m. Meanwhile, crews worked on repairing the line.
Westwood, Hillsdale and River Vale responders either went to to the scene or provided mutual aid.
STORY/PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Senior Correspondent Boyd A. Loving
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A married data entry clerk from Fort Lee had sex with a 14-year-old girl and was being held on $350,000 bail, authorities said this afternoon.
Joey C. Lopez, 52, was arraigned yesterday on charges of sexual assault, aggravated sexual contact and child endangerment following his arrest hours earlier, Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said.
Lopez, of McCloud Drive, was taken into custody by members of Molinelli’s Special Victims Unit and Fort Lee police after a relative of the teen went to police, the prosecutor said.
Detectives from both agencies interviewed the girl and she “described to them in great detail what had occurred,” Molinelli said.
MUGSHOT: Courtesy BERGEN COUNTY PROSECUTOR
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A federal grand jury in Newark today indicted a career criminal in connection with a three-state rampage in which authorities said he raped and kidnapped his ex-girlfriend in Pennsylvania, torched a used car dealership in Paterson and crashed a stolen SUV at either end of the George Washington Bridge.
Luis Figueroa, 33 — who has kept addresses in Ridgefield and the Bronx — is charged with kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse, brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence, being a felon in possession of a firearm, arson and assaulting a U.S. government employee, in the six-count indictment.
Conviction on all of the charges would send him to federal prison for life.
Figueroa was hospitalized at Weill Cornell Medical Center with burns that authorities said he got while trying to burn down a Paterson car dealership a short time before the bridge crashes.
Three PAPD officers were treated for cuts and bruises at Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck.
Port Authority police arrested Figueroa late last November for DWI and outstanding warrants after he refused to take a breath test.
He was wanted for skipping court on those charges when the June 6, three-state crime spree began.
The grand jury indictment says Figueroa was carrying a a Mossberg, model SOOAB, 12 gauge shotgun when he attacked a pregnant woman and then kidnapped his girlfriend from her home in Hazleton and headed to New Jersey.
NJ State Police said Figueroa sexually assaulted the woman at a Route 80 rest stop, hitting her with the butt end of the shotgun.
Somehow she got into the driver’s seat and drove to a local post office in Warren County, where she was found bleeding from the head and fading in and out of consciousness.
Back at the rest stop, Figueroa hid the shotgun, attacked a national parks service worker and stole his car, State Police said.
He then went to a Hosanna Motors on Totowa Avenue in Paterson, which is owned by a relative, and tried trading in the stolen vehicle for the Escalade, authorities said.
When the salesperson refused, Figueroa stole the vehicle — but not before trying to burn down the dealership, they said. The fire was contained to a shed, where authorities said they recovered a gas can and other evidence.
It was around noon when the Cadillac struck a marked Port Authority Suburban with one officer inside at the upper level toll plaza, pushing it onto a concrete divider, Pentangelo said.
It continued across the bridge, hitting a PAPD sedan at the 179th Street ramp, he said.
Figueroa abandoned the disabled Cadillac at the ramp to 179th Street and tried to run but was quickly caught by Port Authority officers, Pentangelo said.
Police found a machete in the car, he said.
CRASH PHOTO: Courtesy Nj.com
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A divorced Park Ridge couple surrendered to federal agents this morning on charges of defrauding Toys R Us and another international company out of a combined $3 million through a bogus marketing business that they secretly owned and operated.
Barbara Brown, 64, was an administrator with Toys R Us in Wayne when the government says she she steered a contract to CEM Direct Marketing — a fictitious company created by her and her husband, Philip Charles DeGrunchy.
From November 2007 through early March 2010, CEM submitted more than 60 invoices for purported consulting work that the then-married couple “either copied from other vendors’ work, was related to other businesses or did not correspond to items on CEM’s invoices,” according to an FBI complaint on file in U.S. District Court in Newark.
CEM had TRU mail checks to various Canadian addresses before they were ultimately deposited at bank branches in White Plains, N.Y.
Checks were then written out of the CEM account payable directly to either de Gruchy or Brown or to Silk Farm and Ontario LLC, companies affiliated with de Gruchy, the federal complaint says.
Brown left the TRU with a severance following a series of poor performance reviews, court records show.
For 16 months, beginning in July 2010, deGruchy worked for Tumi Luggage in South Plainfield as director of global relations management.
While there, he hired Brown for a project without disclosing their relationship, federal authorities said.
From Nov. 4, 2010, through Sept. 22, 2011, the company mailed $216,835 in checks to a Canadian address purporting to belong to Brown or BI Insights, an alleged Canadian company engaged in marketing consulting services and controlled by Brown, the FBI complaint says.
De Gruchy approved all of the invoices, even though “no meaningful work product was furnished,” it says.
“Additional invoices submitted by Brown to [Tumi] totaling $124,150, were not paid after the scheme to defraud was uncovered,” the complaint says.
Brown and deGruchy used the money for themselves, including home renovations, mortgage payments and credit card bills, it says.
After discovering that CEM’s website was registered to Brown’s home address, Toys R Us filed suit in Superior Court in Hackensack — and the government investigated.
Besides CEM, Brown and deGruchy, TRU sued a designated contact person that it said may not even exist.
“CEM was a fraudulent enterprise without any legitimate business purpose or dealings that served merely to advance the objectives of the fraudulent scheme as an instrument of deception and a receptacle to which Brown and DeGruchy could divert stolen or misappropriated monies from TRU and possibly other victims,” the complaint filed in Superior Court in Bergen County said.
Brown personally approved payment of CEM’s invoices, it says.
The company accused CEM of invoicing TRU for a “segmentation analysis” conducted by a different vendor for Brown, for more than $920,000 worth of other reports that it didn’t actually prepare and for nearly $1.8 million that “does not correspond to any actual, ostensible, or noted work product.”
Brown also had more than $369,000 in CEM invoices sitting in her TRU email account that were never submitted, the company added.
Both Brown and deGruchy were released on $250,000 unsecured bonds following a federal court appearance this afternoon in Newark.
U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman praised special agents of the FBI for their work on the investigation. Prosecuting for the government is Assistant U.S. Attorney Leslie Faye Schwartz of Fishman’s Economic Crimes Unit in Newark.
UPDATE: A fire tore through a 2½-story wood-frame house under construction on a Mahwah cul-de-sac, authorities said.
Arson investigators were called to the Lakeview Drive scene off Stag Hill Road.
“It was fully involved when police and firefighters got there” around 9 p.m., an emergency responder told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
Within a half-hour, they went to defensive positions.
Firefighters drafted water from the lake due to a lack of area hydrants. A firefighter slipped partially into the lake during the operation but didn’t fall and wasn’t injured, officials said.
All units were cleared around 1 a.m.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
PHOTOS: Courtesy MAHWAH FD
SHOUT OUT: Fair Lawn police are accepting applications for their 2015 Citizen Police Academy.
Free and open to borough residents 18 and older, the academy will be held Tuesday nights beginning Feb. 5.
It will include classes about gang awareness, firearm awareness and safety, self-defense, fraud awareness and investigations, juvenile concerns, drug awareness and investigations, traffic safety, RADAR familiarization, motor vehicle stops, search and seizure, domestic violence and crime prevention, Sgt. Brian Metzler said.
The academy class will also become familiarized with the different emergency services in Fair Lawn and will be visiting the Bergen County Jail and the Bureau of Criminal Investigation, both overseen by the county sheriff, he said.
Class size is limited to 30 students and background investigations will be conducted before an applicant is accepted, Metzler said.
Applications can be picked up at Fair Lawn Police Headquarters, 8-01 Fair Lawn Avenue.
INFO: Officer Gerard Graziano, Community Policing Division: (201) 794-5365
ONLY ON CVP: Several children were cleared from a Waldwick dance studio last night after someone called in a bomb threat to the complex where it’s located.
The Bergen County Police Bomb Squad checked the North Street complex — which has 10 or so businesses in three buildings — after it was evacuated around 4:50 p.m.
Nothing of note was immediately reported found.
Waldwick police and firefighters also responded.
STORY/PHOTOS: Boyd A. Loving
ONLY ON CVP: A collision of SUVs in Ridgewood htis morning sent one onto a nearby lawn.
No serious injuries were immediately reported in the noon-time crash involving a Toyota Highlander and Lincoln MKX at the corner of Grove Street and South Van Dien Avenue, which caused serious front-end damage to both.
Ridgewood firefighters to a minor fluid spill.
Village police were investigating.
Both vehicles were removed by flatbed tow truck.
STORY/PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Senior Correspondent Boyd A. Loving
YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: A pizza delivery worker involved in a road rage incident near what used to be the Little Ferry circle pulled a realistic-looking gun on the other driver — right in front of a police officer, authorities said.
Officer Angelo Ratto was on a utility detail as work continued on the Route 46 bridge over the Hackensack River when he heard a car horn, turned his head and saw Joshua Mino, 20, of Clifton give another driver the finger yesterday afternoon, Detective Ronald Klein Jr. told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this afternoon.
Mino then reached over to the passenger seat, grabbed an air gun and pointed at his foe, Klein said.
Ratto ordered Mino out of the car and arrested him.
Police impounded the car — which had an undelivered pizza inside, Klein said.
Mino, a Paramus Catholic graduate who was delivering for Pizza Hut in Hackensack, was released on a summons to appear in Municipal Court on a charge of aggravated assault by pointing a firearm.
MUGSHOT: Courtesy LITTLE FERRY PD
