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MAN, 18, CRITICALLY HURT IN PRE-DAWN CAR ACCIDENT

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By MICHAEL O. ALLEN | Thursday, January 2, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A08

An 18-year-old North Bergen man was hospitalized in critical condition Wednesday after he crashed his mother’s car into a telephone pole shortly before dawn on New Year’s Day, police and hospital officials said.

Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy said Paul Ghibesi will be charged with having an open container of beer in the car, possessing alcohol while being under age, and driving a car after his driver’s license had been revoked.

“He has not been charged with DWI,” Fahy said. “The investigation is continuing as whether that charge would be brought. ”
Fahy said it was also unclear whether Ghibesi had been speeding.

Two passengers in the car, James Lucarelli of Guttenberg and Robert Baker, visiting from North Carolina, suffered minor injuries. Baker, 18, was in good condition at Hackensack Medical Center. Lucarelli, also 18, was in satisfactory condition at Englewood Hospital. Ghibesi was being treated at Hackensack Medical Center.

The crash occurred about 4:50 a.m. on Broad Avenue, at the intersection of Prospect Avenue, when Ghibesi lost control of the car and crashed into the pole, Fahy said.

ID: 17364947 | Copyright © 1992, The Record (New Jersey)

January 2, 1992
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RESCUERS SEARCH IN VAIN FOR PLANE CRASH VICTIMS

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, January 2, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A08

Calmer waters Wednesday permitted a boat search of Rhode Island Sound, but rescue crews came up empty-handed in their attempt to locate a commuter airplane that vanished last week with three crew members, including a Dumont man.

New Year’s Day was the first day that weather was good enough to allow a sonar-equipped boat to get to the area of the crash, about eight miles east of Block Island.

Rescuers had little hope of finding any of the three men alive.

Pilot John E. Murphy Jr., 28, of Dumont had been training pilots Michael Kane, 31, of Walden, N.Y., and Michael Lurie, 28, of Massapequa, N.Y., on the twin-engine turboprop aircraft when it disappeared Saturday.

A helicopter had patroled the area, but high seas had prevented a search by a boat owned by American Underwater Search and Survey Ltd. A lobster boat east of Block Island dredged up pieces of the aircraft Sunday, including a 30-foot section of the right wing, a fuselage section with seats, a door with stairs, and part of a bulkhead.

Another boat found a four-foot tail section on Monday about four miles south of Block Island.

ID: 17364948 | Copyright © 1992, The Record (New Jersey)

January 2, 1992
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3 NEWARK BOYS HELD IN CAR THEFTS AT MALLS; APPREHENDED AFTER CHASE IN TEANECK

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Byline: By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, December 28, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A02

Three Newark youths drove a stolen car to Bergen Mall on Thursday, abandoned it in favor of two other cars, and were arrested when the cars collided in Teaneck after a chase on Route 4, police said.

The boys 15, 16, and 17 years old were charged with receiving stolen property and eluding police and were being held Friday in the Bergen County Juvenile Detention Center.

“It’s a gang,” Hackensack Deputy Police Chief John Aletta said. “Every year we get this. After questioning by youth officers, it was learned that they arrived at the mall together in a car stolen from Linden, which they left, and stole two other ones.”

About 2:20 p.m. Thursday, Hackensack Police Officer Mart Kobin heard a report of a theft of a 1990 Pontiac and chased a car matching that description on Route 4, Aletta said.

The car exited Route 4 at Queen Anne Road in Teaneck, where it crashed into a 1989 Chevrolet Cavalier, which was later determined to have been stolen from the Toys “R” Us parking lot adjacent to the Bergen Mall parking lot, where the Pontiac was stolen, he said.

The 17-year-old driver of the Pontiac and the two youths in the Cavalier abandoned the cars and fled on foot, Aletta said. They were arrested after a foot chase that ended on Minelli Place and Allan Court.

ID: 17364671 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 28, 1991
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YEARLONG HUNT VEXES HIT-RUN VICTIM’S BOSS

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, December 21, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Two Star B | NEWS | Page A04

Spencer Joseph worked so long at the IGA supermarket and was so popular around town that he was affectionately regarded as a borough landmark.

“He was one of the best persons around Maywood,” said Harry Tzimoulis, the owner of the supermarket. “He helped everyone. He was very friendly, and they all knew him by his first name. ”

But last year Joseph, 50, died after a hit-and-run accident. Authorities have not caught the driver.

Joseph was struck about 6:30 p.m. on Dec. 19, 1990, as he crossed West Spring Valley Road near Edel Avenue. He died nine hours later in Hackensack Medical Center.

Although the case remains open, the investigation is dormant because no witness to the accident has come forward, Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy said. Joseph was walking from his house to the Forum Diner on Route 4 when the accident occurred at the busy intersection.
A $1,250 reward donated anonymously by two residents and three borough businesses for information leading to an arrest did not help.

“We believe that the car that was involved was a late model Pontiac,” Fahy said. “We have a small fragment of a light that we think came off the car that hit him. ”

Joseph, who authorities said was mildly retarded and was taking medication for epilepsy, had worked in the IGA store for about 30 years.
Tzimoulis said he hopes the driver will develop a guilty conscience and come forward.

“It hurts me badly,” he said. “Spencer was somebody special.”

ID: 17364220 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 21, 1991
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JAIL NEGOTIATIONS BOG DOWN OVER WHO SHOULD PAY

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, December 21, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Two Star B |NEWS | Page A03

Negotiations over a lawsuit aimed at reducing overcrowding at the Bergen County Jail have reached an impasse over funding, the state Public Advocate’s Office says.

The office is expected to go back to court to pursue a class action suit filed on behalf of prisoners against the state and Bergen County in 1988. A hearing is scheduled for Jan. 3.

Negotiations, which had the advocate on one side and the state Attorney General’s Office and Bergen County on the other, had been going on for a year. Many issues, including a cap on the number of inmates, had been resolved, said Audrey Bomse, assistant deputy public advocate.

However, the talks broke down when the state and county feuded over who would pay the costs of meeting the terms of any agreement, Bomse said. “The hang-up is not coming from my end; the hang-up is coming from the county and the state. Both are saying the other should foot the bill,” she said.

State Corrections Department spokesman James Stabile declined to comment on the suit Friday. Bomse said the state maintains it does not have the money or space to move inmates who would be squeezed out of the jail as a result of the settlement. The county, however, says it could not make the improvements needed to meet the agreement at the current level of state funding.

Deputy Bergen County Counsel Murshell Johnson, who, with Bomse, holds out the possibility that an agreement can be reached before the court action resumes, confirmed that money is an issue holding up the settlement.

“You’ve got the executive order that gives the [corrections] commissioner power to house state prisoners in county facilities. However, the funding that is provided to house them is totally inadequate,” she said, adding that the $45 a day the state pays for each prisoner falls short of the $63 it costs the county to house an inmate.

Although it has a rated capacity of 423 inmates, the Bergen County Jail has 1,034. Under a state executive order signed in 1981 and renewed every six months, Bergen County is required to take 72 state prisoners. About 400 inmates are state prisoners.

Bomse said the state and county basically have agreed on a capacity of 800 inmates.

ID: 17364235 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 21, 1991
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MAN CHARGED IN WIFE’S ORDEAL; HE DRENCHED HER WITH GAS, COPS SAY

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Friday, December 20, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 5 Star | NEWS | Page C05

A 27-year-old man abducted his estranged wife from a Teaneck street, drenched her with gasoline, and threatened to set both of them afire if she did not reconcile with him, police said.

Russell J. Kutcher was arrested in a Ridgefield motel where he had taken her, police said. Kutcher was being held Thursdau on $500,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail. His wife, whom police declined to name, was not injured.

The couple, separated since September, were in the process of getting a divorce. The woman had obtained a temporary restraining order against Kutcher on Dec. 13 because he was bothering her, Teaneck police Detective Leonard Pinto said. They were married in February.

Kutcher, a former Garfield resident who had been living at the motel, abducted the 24-year-old Elmwood Park woman about 12:45 p.m. Wednesday as she was talking with a friend at Bergen Street and Blauvelt Avenue near Ridgefield Park, Pinto said.

He dragged her into his 1978 Ford Thunderbird, then pulled a container from the back seat and poured gasoline over her head, Pinto said.

“He held a lighter to me and threatened to kill us both if I didn’t stop screaming,” the woman later told police.

A few minutes later, the frantic friend hailed Ridgefield Park police Sgt. Timothy LaTour, who had just left his house after a lunch break, and told him what had happened. LaTour broadcast a description of Kutcher’s car, and police from Teaneck and Ridgefield joined Ridgefield Park police in the search.

About 1:30 p.m., LaTour found Kutcher’s car in the parking lot of the Turnpike Motor Hotel on Route 46 west.

LaTour said he waited for backup from Ridgefield Park Capt. William Morton and Officer Philip McEntee, Pinto, and Ridgefield Detective Richard Stoltenborg, Investigator William Candeletti, and Officer William Pych, and that police then kicked in the door of Room 59.

“She was inside the room, sitting on the bed, crying,” LaTour said. “He was just walking around with pants, no shirt on.”

Kutcher gave up without incident, police said. Ambulance personnel found his wife covered with gasoline, Stoltenborg said.

Police said Kutcher, an unemployed chef, was staying in the motor hotel for the past week. His last known address was 271 Lanza Ave., Garfield.

He was charged Thursday in Teaneck Municipal Court with abduction and aggravated assault. Bail was set at $100,000. He was charged in Ridgefield with criminal restraint, unlawful imprisonment, making terroristic threats, and contempt of court for violating the restraining order. Bail there was set at $400,000.

ID: 17364118 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 20, 1991
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DRIVER USES GUN TO VENT FRUSTRATION

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, December 19, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 5 Star | NEWS | Page B08

A 19-year-old Englewood man fired several shots in the air, apparently in frustration that the car he was riding in was hemmed into a spot at a parking lot behind The Rink in Bergenfield on Wednesday, police said.

Werner Lewis of East Terrace Circle, being held on $10,000 bail at the Bergen County Jail Annex, was charged with firing the handgun as patrons left the rink about 1:17 a.m. Wednesday, Deputy Police Chief George Grube said.

Two men in the car with Lewis, Miguel Brown of 304 West Palisade Ave., and Marlon Anderson of 217 Wilber St., both 18 and from Englewood, were charged with illegal possession of the same handgun and were being held on $5,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail, Grube said.

About 20 off-duty police officers were working as security guards at The Rink that night, one of the busiest nights there, Grube said. They found a .32-caliber handgun, three spent shells, and nine live rounds in the car, he added.

“Apparently, he didn’t try to hit anybody,” Grube said of Lewis.

The deputy chief said it was the third shooting in Bergenfield during the past nine days. A man fired two shots Sunday into the bulletproof window at the South Washington Street Amoco gas station during a robbery, Grube said. The attendant was uninjured, although the man escaped with $58.

A 27-year-old Englewood Cliffs man was freed on $20,000 bail Dec. 8, after being charged with firing a gun at a crowd outside a Bergenfield Tavern. No one was hit.

Grube said Wednesday’s shooting at The Rink was the second one there this year. A man fired a shot into a crowd in January but did not strike anyone, he said.

ID: 17364080 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 19, 1991
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ENGLEWOOD WOMAN HOME SAFELY; HUSBAND MAY FACE KIDNAPPING CHARGE

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, December 19, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 5 Star 3| NEWS | Page B03

A 37-year-old Ridgefield woman, allegedly kidnapped by her estranged husband and taken to his Middletown, N.Y., home, has returned home unharmed, police said.

City police are seeking to extradite John Louis Ruggiero from New York to face a kidnapping charge, Capt. C. Kenneth Tinsley said Wednesday.

Ruggiero, 41, was being held without bail in Orange County Jail on charges of criminal possession of cocaine, drug paraphernalia, two handguns, and fireworks, New York State Police Investigator Thomas Wood said.

Margaret Ruggiero was reported missing by her mother, Dorothy McDermott, about 3:30 p.m. Tuesday. Workers at the obstetrician’s office where Ruggiero works called McDermott to say they had not seen her daughter all day, although her car was parked outside, said Detective Scott Jenkins, who investigated the case with Detective Sgt. David Bowman.

McDermott called police about 6 p.m., after receiving a call from her daughter, and said that Ruggiero had been kidnapped by her husband that morning and was being held at his home.

Ruggiero later told police that her husband had come up behind her and forced her into his car as she arrived at work in Englewood about 8:45 a.m. Tuesday, Jenkins said.

He drove her to Middletown, telling her that he would not harm her and that he just wanted to talk. He allowed her to make the call that led to her return home, she said.

ID: 17364085 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 19, 1991
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POLICE CHASE, CHARGE SIX TEENS AFTER REPORT OF HOUSE BREAK-IN

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, December 19, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 5 Star | NEWS | Page B02

Six Dwight Morrow High School students were charged with burglary and theft after police, responding to a report of a break-in at a house, caught the suspects after a chase.

Five of the students four girls ages 14 to 17, and a 15-year-old boy were taken into protective custody after the chase, which ended a few minutes after noon Tuesday in a field at the rear of the high school, police said. The five were released to their parents.

Police were looking for the sixth student, a 14-year-old girl, on Wednesday, Police Capt. C. Kenneth Tinsley said.

Several police officers on patrol, including Police Chief William Luciano, heard the report of the burglary at a house on Liberty Avenue, Tinsley said. A resident called police and told them he saw youths carrying brightly colored knapsacks coming out of his neighbor’s house.

Luciano and several patrolmen caught the students after a short foot chase.

The students had several rings and other jewelry determined to have been stolen from the Liberty Avenue home, along with a sealed United Parcel Service packet that had just been delivered to a Lantana Avenue address, police said.

A Bergen County police dog, employed to search the area because of the distance between where the students were caught and where the break-in was reported, found a knapsack containing wrapped presents and jewelry in a bush behind the burglarized home, police said.

Police could not say whether the students had been involved in other burglaries in the area.

“There have been previous burglaries in that area, and we’ve made arrests of young adults, but we haven’t linked these youngsters to other burglaries in the area,” Tinsley said.

Dwight Morrow Principal Richard Segall said he was unaware of the arrest but that the students would be appropriately punished if they had been charged with such crimes.

ID: 17364091 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 19, 1991
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NEIGHBORS AID TENANTS DISPLACED BY FIRE

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, December 14, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Two Star B | NEWS | Page A04

Neighbors have begun raising money to help tenants of 6 Edison Place, who were displaced Wednesday by a fire that gutted the wood-frame, two-family house.

The fire was caused by an electrical malfunction, Detective Jerry Winston said Friday.

Robert Johnson, 65, jumped out a window of his second-floor apartment but was uninjured, Winston said. Joshua Favor, 16, was taken to Hackensack Medical Center with cuts on both hands and an injury to his right toe. Elviria Dewf also was taken to the hospital and was treated for smoke inhalation.

Favor’s mother, Luella, 39, Detective Sgt. Kenneth Felten, and police Officer Dennis Rivelli were treated at the scene for smoke inhalation. Firefighter Mario Rivezzi was treated for eye irritation.

Neither police nor fire officials could confirm how many people lived in the house.

Cheryl Chenier of 1 Edison Place said neighbors, in a door-to-door effort, collected about $300 for the families and have opened an account at the National Community Bank for boroughwide fund-raising.

The families are being lodged by the American Red Cross at Days Inn in East Rutherford.

ID: 17363584 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

December 14, 1991
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