Death Archives - MICHAEL O. ALLEN

FAMILY ID’S SON’S BODY, THEN LEARNS HE’S ALIVE

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, April 12, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | A03

Members of John Howe’s family thought he had died in a train accident Thursday night. On Friday, they found out he hadn’t.

His boss, his brother, and his parents on Friday identified a body taken to the Rockland County, N.Y., morgue as that of Howe, Suffern Village Police Chief Leo Costa said Saturday.

“Each one positively said that it was him,” Costa said. “No doubt about it.”

But then Howe, 22, was later spotted walking along a Spring Valley, N.Y., street with his girlfriend.

The body in the morgue was subsequently identified as that of Charles Horton, 24, of Wayne Avenue, Suffern. He was struck and killed near Suffern by an NJ Transit train Thursday night. Police said no identification was found on the body.

Dr. Frederick Zugibe, Rockland County chief medical examiner, said Saturday that Howe’s mother, father, and brother came to the morgue in Pomona five hours after the body was discovered and identified it as Howe’s. They were called shortly after Howe’s boss was summoned to the morgue and made the initial identification.

In a followup investigation to determine Howe’s whereabouts before the accident, police tracked down his girlfriend and found the two in Spring Valley.

Police did not identify Howe’s relatives, boss, or girlfriend.

Costa said the two men bore a strong facial resemblance. Authorities were able to identify Horton through his fingerprints.

A woman described by Costa as Horton’s common-law wife had called police to ask if they knew where he was.

April 12, 1992

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1 OF 2 MEN HIT BY TRAIN DIES FROM HIS INJURIES

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Friday, March 27, 1992

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

A 23-year-old borough man struck by a commuter train as he and a friend walked along the tracks has died, authorities said.

Cecilio Gonzalez of Wyckoff Avenue died at 1:54 a.m. Thursday, about seven hours after the accident, said Anne Marie Loughran, a Hackensack Medical Center spokeswoman.

Andre Barahona, 41, of Franklin Turnpike, whose left arm was broken when he also was hit by the NJ Transit train, was improving Thursday and was upgraded from critical to stable condition, said a spokesman for University Hospital in Newark.

Barahona was flown to the hospital by helicopter after the accident at 6:41 p.m. Wednesday about 300 yards north of the Wyckoff Avenue railroad overpass.

The men may have been drinking, and one was apparently listening to a radio because a headset was found at the scene, Waldwick Police Sgt. Brian Cotter said.

“According to the engineer, he sounded his horn but they didn’t move from the track,” Cotter said. “There was a bottle of vodka found embedded in the front of the train. It was in a plastic bag, attached to the front of the engine.”

An autopsy, which would determine whether Gonzalez was drinking, is pending, Cotter said.

One of the men was walking between the rails and the other was walking outside the rails when they were struck by the train, Cotter said. One of the victims told rescuers they were returning home from work, Cotter added.

The train was carrying 13 passengers and traveling about 40 mph at the time of the accident, said NJ Transit spokeswoman Kathleen Donohue. Waldwick was the final stop for the train, which left Hoboken with about 300 passengers, she said.

March 27, 1992

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OFFICER DIES FROM HEAD INJURY; DAVID C. MORRIS WAS 26 YEARS OLD

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, January 19, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A06

A Park Ridge police officer who was critically injured when he fell in the parking lot of his apartment building and was later placed on life support died Saturday, a Pascack Valley Hospital spokeswoman said.

Patrolman David C. Morris was 26 years old.

Park Ridge Police Chief Robert Minugh called it a “terrible tragedy.”

Morris, who had been out with friends, arrived at his Hawthorne Avenue apartment about 1 a.m., the chief said. Two friends had lost sight of him for a few minutes, and when they next saw him he was lying on the ground with a head injury.

He was taken by ambulance to Pascack Valley Hospital in Westwood and placed on life support after he was diagnosed as having suffered brain damage from a blood clot, the chief said. He was removed from life support at 5:50 a.m. Saturday after his family was consulted.

“He was an excellent officer, a very fine young man,” Minugh said.

At the Teaneck Police Department, where Morris began his career in January 1987, news that he had been injured and was not expected to live hit hard Friday. Although he resigned from the department in September 1988 to take the Park Ridge job, his mother lives in Teaneck and he had many friends on the force.

“Obviously, it was a shock to hear of the accident,” Teaneck Capt. Gary S. Fiedler said. “I saw him just the other day; he stopped by here Wednesday.”

Chief Donald Giannone said Morris was “a personable guy who performed his functions in a professional manner.” Although his tenure was short, he said, he left in good standing.

Obituary. A-20

January 19, 1992

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SPECTATOR SEATS AREN’T ALL NEEDED BUT PRESS OVERFLOWS COURTROOM

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, January 16, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A11

Although spectators started gathering outside the Bergen County Courthouse about 7 a.m. on Wednesday, several of the 53 seats set aside for the public went begging on the day of opening arguments in Gary S. Spath’s reckless manslaughter trial.

The spectators who lined up before a double-glass door leading to the first-floor courtroom were waved in 10 at a time by Sheriff’s Officer George Kellinger shortly before the 9 a.m. start of the trial.

The initial seating included 39 spectators, plus six representatives of families of Spath and Phillip C. Pannell, as well as members of the press. Only 31 spectators attended in the afternoon.

Everyone entering the courtoom was frisked, sent through a walk-through metal detector, and then reinspected with a hand-held metal detector. Bergen County Undersheriff Jay Alpert attributed the tight security to anticipation of heavy demand for seats and the number of witnesses expected to testify at the trial.

All of the 19 seats set aside for the press were taken, and a special media room was set up on the second floor to handle the overflow. Nearly a score of reporters, cameramen, and technicians crammed into the 12-foot-square room to stare intently at two television monitors tuned to coverage of the trial provided by Court TV, a cable network. Space was so tight many sat cross-legged on the floor.

Several of the spectators including Beverly Lefkowitz, president of the Teaneck Parent-Teacher Association said they were drawn to the trial because they had closely followed the case since Spath shot Pannell in April 1990.

“The case reflects a lot of turmoil in the town that many of us are trying to address,” she said.

Lloyd Riddick, 57, a retired Teaneck resident, said he was attending to show support for the Pannells.

“Something happened to a friend of mine, an African-American, and I see the way the system is leaning. So, if my appearance here evens the scales of justice a little bit, then I’ll do so. Anything I can do to help,” he said.

Caption: PHOTO – AL PAGLIONE / THE RECORD – The trial of Teaneck police Officer Gary S. Spath getting under way in a Hackensack courtroom Wednesday morning.

Notes: MAIN STORY FILED SEPARATELY – OPENING ARGUMENTS FOCUS ON ISSUE OF PANNELL’S GUN. DID SPATH KNOW OF WEAPON? THE SPATH TRIAL – Page a01

January 16, 1992

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BODY FOUND ON GOLF COURSE IDENTIFIED

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Friday, November 15, 1991

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

The skeletal remains of a body found on a Rockland County golf course have been identified as those of a 23-year-old Paramus man who had been missing since August, authorities said.

Jay Karl Papa died from numerous stab wounds to the chest, the Rockland County Medical Examiner’s Office said. He was identified Wednesday through dental records.

Papa’s body was discovered Monday afternoon in bushes at the old Chateau D’Vie Golf Course in New Hempstead by a man walking his dog.

Dr. Frederick Zugibe, Rockland medical examiner, said it was unclear whether Papa was killed at the scene or was dumped there later.

“This is such a horrible death. He was a nice kid,” said Paramus Police Chief Joseph Delaney, whose department, along with state and federal authorities, had been working on Papa’s disappearance.

Delaney said Papa, a 1986 graduate of Paramus High School, had been missing since the last week of August.

Fort Lee police found Papa’s red, two-door 1987 Mitsubishi parked on a borough street, near Route 9W, about a week and half ago, Delaney said. The car’s doors were locked, and there was nothing in it.

Residents in the area said the car had been parked there since Labor Day weekend, Delaney said.

Papa was wearing an extra-large short-sleeve shirt with a Florida State University logo, a crucifix, slacks, and white sneakers, the chief said. A Mitsubishi car key found on the body started the car found in Fort Lee.

Ramapo town police are investigating.

The Chateau D’Vie Golf Course is now being redeveloped under the name of the New York Country Club Golf Course.

Delaney said he played in the same windmill softball league with Papa, and that his father, former Paramus recreation commissioner Victor Papa, coached teams in the league.

“A very nice kid, very polite. He was liked by many people, especially people in the league,” Delaney said.

“The family was well-known and respected in the community.”

Caption: (5s, 3s, 2s, 1s) PHOTO – Jay Karl Papa in Paramus High School yearbook picture, 1986.

November 15, 1991

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HOMEMADE PLANE CRASHES; FRANKLIN LAKES MAN KILLED; CRAFT HIT CABLE OVER U.S. PARK

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Friday, October 25, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 6 Star | NEWS | Page B03

A 26-year-old Franklin Lakes man was killed Wednesday when a single-engine plane he was flying over a national park hit a television cable, landed upside down in the Delaware River, and broke into pieces, authorities said.

Laurence W.P. Rizzo died instantly from the impact of the experimental, homemade aircraft on the water, Pike County Coroner James J. Martin said.

Rizzo had been a flight instructor for about 15 months at Sussex Airport. He had taken off from the airport at about 2 p.m., airport manager Paul Styger said. The plane crashed about 50 minutes later in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area in Pike County, chief ranger Barry Sullivan said.

Rizzo was pulled from 4 feet of water, Sullivan said. Martin pronounced him dead at 3:12 p.m. He said Rizzo died of a broken neck.

Rizzo was alone when the plane crashed. The tail section separated from the rest of the fuselage.

Styger said Rizzo, who was born and raised in Paterson before moving to Franklin Lakes in 1976, had been teaching flying at the airport while building up time to apply for work as either a corporate or commercial airline pilot. Rizzo was a 1990 graduate of LeTourneau University in Long View, Texas.

Witnesses told Stroudsburg radio station WSBG-WVPO the plane had been flying low and appeared to have engine trouble as it dipped over the river, striking a cable line.

The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating the cause of the crash, agency spokesman Duncan Pardue said Thursday.

Pardue described the aircraft as a wood and fiberglass plane built from a kit.

This article contains material from The Associated Press.

Keywords: PENNSYLVANIA; AVIATION; ACCIDENT; DEATH; FRANKLIN LAKES; MAN; LAURENCE RIZZO

October 25, 1991

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RESCUE TRAINING AT DEADLY POND TO SAVE LIVES, NOT FIND BODIES

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, September 29, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A03

Kingsley Pond, with its shimmering brownish-green surface, has been the site of many drownings in past years. Saturday, it was the site of rescue training for the Oakland Fire Department scuba team.
Joe Bogonian, the team’s coordinator-dive master and a member of Oakland’s first dive team, said the emphasis since the group was formed 21 years ago had been on recovering bodies and objects.
“We weren’t so much thinking about rescuing people,” Bogonian said.
But, as Oakland Fire Chief Roy Bauberger said Saturday, new methods of reviving near-drowning victims have since been developed.
On Saturday, the procedures were being taught by Lifeguard Systems, a training group, to Oakland’s 10-member scuba team, plus 10 divers from the Bergen County Police Department and the Pompton Lakes, Lyndhurst, and Wallington fire departments. Butch Hendrick, president of the Hurley, N.Y., group, said it teaches tactical water operations to military, police, fire, and emergency medical service workers.
Oakland has several bodies of water including Potash Lake, where two men drowned last year, and Kingsley Pond, where a 17-year-old drowned four years ago.
Matt Gallup, an Oakland firefighter and a member of the first aid squad, said he was startled at first when he came face to face with a bass on his first dive Saturday. He was supposed to rescue a baby-size mannequin in the training.
“It looks pretty easy, jumping in the water and just swimming,” Gallup said. “But you take a pretty good beating down there.”
A diver may have to go around many objects tree limbs, refrigerators, automobile parts, and other debris to reach the victim.
The problem with most dive teams, Hendrick said, is that they are sport oriented and not prepared to retrieve a body or objects in black or difficult waters.
The weekend’s training the first leg was at the man-made Kingsley Pond three weeks ago concludes there today.

Keywords: RESCUE; FIREMAN; LAKE; OAKLAND; SWIMMING; ACCIDENT; DEATH; VICTIM

Caption: 1 – PHOTO – ROBERT S. TOWNSEND / THE RECORD – Above, rescue personnel participating in training exercises from the banks of Kingsley Pond on Saturday. 2 – PHOTO – ROBERT S. TOWNSEND / THE RECORD – Below, Robert Ventura, left, and Tony Galka of the Wallington Fire Department practicing procedures as a dive team one man stands by just offshore to aid the diver.

September 29, 1991

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WIFE OF FORMER OFFICIAL IS FOUND DEAD

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, September 26, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 6 Star | NEWS | Page B03

Josephine Irene Mary Schmid, wife of former Teaneck Township Manager Werner Schmid, has died in an incident police are investigating, officials said.
Josephine Schmid, 60, died Monday of multiple fractures, internal injuries, and hemorrhaging after she tumbled from a bridge on the New Jersey Turnpike’s western spur in Kearny, Pat Raviola, a Hudson County assistant prosecutor, said Wednesday.
Police did not know what happened. State Trooper Nick Cagnole found what appeared to be an abandoned car along the turnpike. He found Schmid’s body on a dirt road under the spur, adjacent to the Conrail tracks, police said.
Schmid was pronounced dead at the scene, and her husband identified her body, Raviola said.
Werner Schmid retired as township manager in July 1988 after 33 years in office. He could not be reached Wednesday.
Frank Hall, a Teaneck councilman and former mayor, expressed regret at the death. Werner Schmid is a private man who shielded his family from his public life, Hall said in declining to comment further.
Acting Township Manager Gary A. Saage called Werner Schmid the most honest public official he knew in the 25 years he worked with him, but declined to comment further.

Keywords: TEANECK; OFFICIAL; MARRIAGE; WOMAN; DEATH; PROBE

September 26, 1991

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MAN, 23, FATALLY SHOT OUTSIDE HIS HOME

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, August 22, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Four Star B | NEWS | Page B03

A 23-year-old man was fatally shot in front of his home Tuesday night by a man who had come to his door asking for water for his car radiator, officials said.
Sergio Novo died at 3:55 a.m. in the surgical intensive care unit of University Hospital in Newark of a gunshot wound to the head, a hospital spokesman said.
Investigators do not know the motive for the shooting, nor do they have a suspect, said Bergen County First Assistant Prosecutor Paul Brickfield. Authorities do not believe robbery was a motive, he added.
“We are actively investigating his movements over the last few days and his associations and activities to try to come up with who might have had a motive to shoot him, or if this was a random activity,” Brickfield said.
Shortly before 10 p.m. Tuesday, Brickfield said, an unidentified man knocked on the door at 30 Truman Road, where Novo lived with his parents and grandmother. Novo went outside with a pitcher of water for the man, who had requested it for his car radiator.
Shortly afterward, Novo’s family and neighbors heard a “metallic noise and the sound of a car screeching,” Brickfield said. A neighbor went outside and found Novo lying on the street.
Brickfield said witnesses saw a late-model, four-door car, blue or black, possibly a Buick Century or Electra, stopped in the middle of Truman Road.
On Wednesday afternoon, John Penetra, whose son Luis was a friend of the victim, went to visit Novo’s family at their single-family home at the corner of Halsey Place and Truman Road. No one answered the door.
Penetra had heard about the shooting and wanted to find out if it were true.
“Sergio, he’s a beautiful man,” Penetra said in heavily accented English. “What a shame. I can’t believe this.”
He spoke in Spanish with a woman on Halsey Place; she told him no one had seen the shooting but that afterward everyone had come out of their homes.
Other neighbors, including a woman who said Novo was “a nice young fellow,” declined to comment or to be identified.
Novo had been a New Jersey Bell cable installer for the past 16 months and was a U.S. Navy veteran, officials said.
The shooting is being investigated by North Arlington police, the homicide squad of the Prosecutor’s Office, and the Bergen County Sheriff’s Department.
Anyone with information is asked to call the North Arlington police at 991-4400 or the homicide squad at 646-2300.

Keywords: NORTH ARLINGTON; SHOOTING; DEATH; MURDER

August 22, 1991

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TWO DIE IN RTE. 80 COLLISION; CAR REAR-ENDS TRUCK ON SLICK HIGHWAY

By michael o. allenHomepage, The RecordNo Comments

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Tuesday, August 20, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Four Star B | NEWS | Page B01

A Bronx couple were killed and their two children injured Monday morning when their car spun out of control on rain-soaked Route 80 in Bogota and struck the back of a truck parked on the shoulder, state police said.
Haredin Sokoli, 33, who was driving, and his common-law wife, Farije Xheraj, 32, died at the scene. Neither was wearing a seat belt, state police Sgt. Bob Cooney said.
Lide Sokoli, 11, and her brother, Niam, 10, were in fair condition at Hackensack Medical Center, the girl with a broken leg and the boy with cuts and bruises, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Dr. John LoCurto, director of the hospital’s trauma center, and paramedics Don Holmes and Zach Weissman, as well as numerous Ridgefield Park police, firefighters, and rescue workers, helped remove the children from the back seat, where they were pinned.
Bob Carlson, a senior member of the Ridgefield Park Rescue Squad, said they had to use air bags and hydraulic lifts to raise the truck to allow the paramedics to get to the children.
The accident occurred at 11:35 a.m. in the local lanes of Route 80, about a half-mile from the intersection of Routes 95 and 46, Cooney said.
“There was a truck parked on the right shoulder, eastbound at milepost 67.4 in Bogota, due to a previous accident,” he said. “A 1985 Buick Century was eastbound when the driver lost control for an unknown reason on the wet roadway. It struck the left rear of the parked truck.”
Jeannette Gnecco, 41, of Ridgefield Park, said she saw the traffic jam about noon and noticed the accident ahead. She got off the road an exit before the accident and watched the rescue effort, along with about 30 other people, from the North Street bridge, which overlooks Route 80.
“The had to jack up the truck, pull off the roof of the car to get to the kids,” said James Gnecco, her 46-year-old husband. “You almost couldn’t believe anybody came out of it alive.”
Gail Campbell, 45, of Ridgefield Park also watched the rescue effort with her 12-year-old son, Mark. Her husband, Edward, a 10-year member of the rescue squad, was part of the rescue effort.
“It upsets me,” Campbell said. “Those poor people didn’t know what hit them. . . . Pray for them. That’s all you can do.”

Keywords: BOGOTA; MOTOR VEHICLE; ACCIDENT; DEATH

Caption: 2 COLOR PHOTOS BY DANIELLE P. RICHARDS / THE RECORD 1 – A rescue worker holding a child who was trapped in the back seat of a car involved in a fatal accident on Route 80 in Bogota. 2 – The Bronx couple in the front seat died, and their two children were hospitalized with injuries.

August 20, 1991

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