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LEGISLATORS ASSAIL INSURANCE CHIEF

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, November 3, 1991

Publication: The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A07

State Insurance Commissioner Samuel F. Fortunato has come under fire by Assembly Democrats for saying that he opposes lifting surcharges on drivers who, except for minor infractions, have clean records.

Fortunato told The Record’s editorial board Wednesday that it would be unwise and wasteful to change the state-run Market Transition Facility, or MTF, so motorists with minor infractions would be spared the surcharges.

A group of Assembly Democrats, including Speaker Joseph V. Doria Jr. of Bayonne, said during a news conference Friday at Borough Hall that they disagree with Fortunato.

“We in the Legislature create the laws, and we don’t feel the commissioner should arbitrarily make decisions that contravene the intent of legislations,” Doria said. “Commissioners of departments are not above the Legislature. The surcharge system that currently exists in the MTF, the bureaucrats have created it. They created it without the approval of the Legislature.”

Assemblyman Louis J. Gill of Passaic, who is co-sponsoring a bill to prohibit the MTF from imposing surcharges greater than those in the private insurance market, said he would push to make the bill law in the Assembly’s next session.

Assemblyman William J. Pascrell Jr. of Paterson said Fortunato had better rethink his position or face losing his job.

“If he is not prepared to act before the next Assembly gets in session, I would be prepared to ask for his resignation, because this is an act of defiance of the Legislature,” Pascrell said.

Jim Berzok, an Insurance Department spokesman, said on Friday that Fortunato was merely expressing a personal opinion on the surcharge system during the editorial board meeting. Berzok said the commissioner will abide by whatever is decreed by the Legislature or Governor Florio.

“He is certainly willing to entertain any alternative plan,” Berzok said.

ID: 17359926 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

November 3, 1991
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FLORIO SEEKS NEW WIRETAP LAWS CITES ELECTRONIC USE IN CRIME

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, October 24, 1991

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

Against a din of voices protesting his policies, Governor Florio on Wednesday proposed updating state wiretap laws to enable law enforcement officials to intercept communications on electronic devices such as beepers and fax machines.

“It is time we stop fighting crime with one hand tied behind our back,” Florio said in front of city police headquarters as he proposed the amendment, which Assemblymen Byron M. Baer, D-Englewood, and D. Bennett Mazur, D-Fort Lee, said they would introduce in the Assembly next month.

The amendment would target drug dealers and organized drug activities, Florio said, and would allow police to get court orders to intercept communications on beepers, faxes, and cellular telephones, which they are not allowed to do under current law.

“If there is anything we’ve learned about dealing with drug dealers, it’s that they are very sophisticated. They keep up with the times. They are right in there using all the high technology to further their bad business. Today they communicate with beepers, computers, fax machines, whatever,” he said.

Current laws allow law enforcement officials to get court orders to wiretap traditional telephones when they suspect criminal activities are taking place. New Jersey failed to update its laws in this area in 1988, as required in a 1986 law updating federal wiretap laws, the governor said.

Hackensack Police Chief William C. Iurato said any tool that assists police in fighting drugs is appreciated, particularly in the areas delineated in Florio’s proposed legislation.

Lt. Ron Natale, commander of the department’s detective bureau, said the proposed amendment would enable police to remove drugs from the streets as well as conduct other investigations.

Natale mentioned a search in June for Kelly Gonzalez, a 4-year-old Hackensack girl kidnapped from her home because her father was allegedly involved in a dispute over drugs. Kelly was returned to her mother after eight days in captivity.

“He, the victim’s father, had beeper contact with numerous people, and had we had legislation of this nature at that time, it may have led to a more speedy recovery of the victim,” Natale said.

Baer said he would work to get the bill passed quickly.

“Without these tools, even the legendary Elliot Ness and Joe Friday would be left behind by modern criminals who use beepers, radios, computers, fax machines, ultramodern automatic weapons, and cop-killer bullets,” Baer said.

A group of about 30 placard-carrying protesters waited for Florio, heckled him during his 10-minute speech, then booed when he finished. An amused smile playing on his face, he weathered cries of “Florio, go home” and other shouts from passing motorists.

“It’s the political season, after all,” Florio said.

Keywords: FLORIO; NEW JERSEY; LAW; ELECTRONIC; HACKENSACK; POLICE; CRIME

Caption: PHOTO – JOHN DECKER / THE RECORD – Governor Florio on the steps of police headquarters in Hackensack on Wednesday calling for updated state laws on the use of wiretaps.

ID: 17358984 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

October 24, 1991
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N.J. BRIDGING RIFT WITH MUSLIMS

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Monday, October 7, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A05

A faux pas by state Attorney General Robert J. Del Tufo for which he has since apologized is serving to bridge a perceived chasm between the Department of Law and Public Safety and the state’s Muslim communities.
A further step in the healing process which follows published remarks by Del Tufo warning of possible terrorism by Muslims in New Jersey during the Persian Gulf war was a meeting Sunday afternoon at the Dar-Ul-Islah Mosque in Teaneck.
Assistant Attorney General James F. Mulvihill met with about 200 worshipers at the mosque to explain state standards for investigating bias incidents.
Del Tufo appointed Mulvihill as liaison between his office and Muslims following a meeting in August with a seven-member Muslim delegation to discuss his remarks. Mulvihill was accompanied by Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy, who also addressed the audience, which included Teaneck Mayor Eleanor M. Kieliszek.
Mulvihill told his audience that the laws and procedure for reporting bias crimes are in place, but that a Muslim who is a victim of a bias attack must report the incident to police so it can be “thoroughly and promptly investigated.”
Mulvihill said that of 824 bias crimes reported to the state police in 1990, six including two at the Dar-Ul-Islah Mosque were directed at Muslims.
“What we have to do in government is to send a loud and clear message that hate crime is not going to be tolerated,” Mulvihill said.
He urged his listeners to get involved in countywide community-relations boards so they could educate the public about their lives and culture.
He also urged them to apply to join police forces and to run for seats on boards of education and other public bodies, noting that that is how most immigrant groups in this country managed to have their voices heard.
Waheed Khalid, a member of the executive committee of the Dar-Ul-Islah Mosque, served as moderator during the meeting, which also included a question-and-answer session. Much of the ill will from Del Tufo’s remarks has dissipated because of the meeting in August and steps he has since taken to reach out to Muslims, Khalid said.
Muslims face the challenge of going out and educating the public about their religion and way of life, Khalid said.

Keywords: GOVERNMENT; NEW JERSEY; ATTORNEY; TERRORISM; MOSLEM; PERSIAN GULF WAR; TEANECK

ID: 17357406 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

October 7, 1991
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STORE IS ROBBERY’S SECOND FATALITY; SHOP CLOSING AFTER N.J. MAN IS KILLED

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, October 6, 1991

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

Daisy Benitez says being held up is something the merchants in her area learn to live with. But after a robbery claimed the life of a Tenafly man in her store, she says she’s closing up shop.
Benjamin Braddock Peisch, 24, of Oak Street was shot and killed Thursday night when he walked in on a robbery of the Daisy Bariete clothing store in Upper Manhattan and intervened.
Benitez, 34, of Queens said Saturday that she would sell her stock T-shirts, jeans, socks and close her doors for good.
“If he hadn’t had a fight with them, they wouldn’t have shot him,” Benitez said in Spanish, translated by her 24-year-old niece, Florence Ramos. “They threw him on the floor twice and told him to stay there. He kept getting up.”
John Mullin, a Tenafly High School social studies teacher, said Peisch was just the kind of person to intervene if he saw something amiss.
“This kid was a gentleman through and through; he’s always stood up for the underdog,” Mullin said. “It would have been a surprise to me that something wrong was going on and he didn’t try to set it right.”
Tenafly High School Vice Principal Bernard Josefsberg said the death was a shock to everyone at the school.
“This was really a great kid,” he said.
On graduation from the school in 1986, Peisch was given a $500 scholarship by the Tenafly Lions Club, in part for demonstrating seriousness of purpose and civic consciousness, Josefsberg said Friday.
His family declined to comment.
Peisch, a junior at Montclair State College, first came to the store about two weeks ago and stopped to talk with one of the saleswomen, Benitez said. He seemed to like the woman and returned to talk to her twice, she said.
The three robbers came in about 6 p.m. Thursday, put guns to the backs of three employees, and herded them into the back of main area of the store, in the basement of a residential building at 568 W. 171 St.
“He came down in the middle of all this and went to the girl’s defense,” Benitez said.
The robbers knocked him to the ground twice, Ramos said, the second time hitting him with the butt of a handgun and opening a gash in the back of his head. In the ensuing struggle, as the three men ganged up on Peisch, one shot him in the chest, she said.
No one else was injured, and the men escaped with an unspecified amount of money. Benitez said the employees working in the store at the time of the robbery had quit and would not return.
Police on Saturday were looking for witnesses, said New York City police Sgt. Tina Mohrmann.

Keywords: ROBBERY; STORE; CLOSING; NEW JERSEY; MURDER; TENAFLY; SHOOTING; NEW YORK CITY; CLOTHING; BENJAMIN BRADDOCK PEISCH

ID: 17357316 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

October 6, 1991
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GWB TRAFFIC ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT

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MICHAEL O. ALLEN | Sunday, September 22, 1991

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

New Jersey-bound drivers who braved the George Washington Bridge on Saturday ran into a 20-minute delay in the morning caused by construction work on the lower level, Port Authority officials said.
Although traffic thinned later in the day, motorists still are advised to consider returning to the state via the Lincoln and Holland tunnels, said Port Authority Police Sgt. Dominik Evangelista.
Construction started at 7 p.m. Friday and will last until 3 p.m. Monday, he said.

Keywords: BRIDGE; CLOSING; ROAD; REPAIR; NEW YORK CITY; NEW JERSEY

ID: 17356071 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

September 22, 1991
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TRAPS TO SNARE PARKWAY SPEEDERS

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Wednesday, September 11, 1991

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

In a pilot program to crack down on speeding, the state police will set up speed traps at nine points along the Garden State Parkway one day a week, beginning this week.
“The main goal of the program is to have people voluntarily comply with the speed limit, to reduce their speed,” said Capt. Clifford Miller, commander of Troop E, which patrols the 173-mile parkway. “We don’t want to issue speeding summonses. We want them to slow down. ”
Miller said 31 people died in accidents on the parkway between January and August, compared with 27 all of last year. More than 344 million vehicles travel on the parkway each year; about 58,000 speeding tickets were issued on the highway last year, he said.
“Although the parkway is still one of the safest toll roads in the nation, we are aiming at reducing the number of fatal accidents and the number of serious-injury accidents,” Miller said. “We think that by reducing speed and wearing their seat belts,” motorists “can substantially reduce the number of serious accidents. ”
“Operation Slow Down” will be evaluated in three months, and the state police plan to extend it to other highways if it is successful, said Lt. William Hillis, a state police spokesman.
New Jersey has tried a variety of programs to curb speeding on its 34,246 miles of public roads, including enforcement from helicopters, Hillis said. Regular patrols of the parkway and other state highways will continue during the crackdown, he said.
The state police will not announce where the speed traps will be or which day of the week they will be operating, Hillis said. The days and sites of the crackdown will be staggered and will run for 24 hours at a time, he said. Troopers will be using both radar and non-radar equipment to catch speeders, he said.

Keywords: ROAD; NEW JERSEY; POLICE; MOTOR VEHICLE; EQUIPMENT; VIOLATION

Caption: PHOTO – LINDA CATAFFO / THE RECORD – State police are kicking off “Operation Slow Down” this week in an attempt to crack down on speeding on the Garden State Parkway.

ID: 17354846 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

September 11, 1991
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ANGRY N.J. SURVIVOR CITES DELAY IN RESCUE

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By Elizabeth Auster and Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writers | Thursday, August 1, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Four Star B | NEWS | Page A10

“You have no idea how horrifying this has been.”
It was 9 p.m., 16 hours after the disaster. But Peter Cepeda, pacing agitatedly in Washington’s Union Station amid busloads of passengers who had just arrived from South Carolina, still could barely control his rage.
Yes, he was alive and bound for his home in Newark. But he makes his living in New Jersey as a doctor, and he had lost a patient Wednesday a man he didn’t know until Amtrak’s Silver Star derailed, and Cepeda, who had been in the third car from the rear, went looking for casualties in the next car.
The man’s arm and leg had been severed, Cepeda said, and he was bleeding profusely from multiple lacerations. Cepeda and another passenger, Robert Moore of Miami, said they tried tourniquets to stanch the blood. They tried mouth-to-mouth resuscitation when the man periodically lost consciousness.
But at least an hour passed, Cepeda said, before he saw an ambulance. By the time help arrived, the man was gone, Cepeda and Moore said.
“There was nothing we could do,” said Cepeda. “It was a real traumatic experience.”
Cepeda was among several New Jersey residents on the Amtrak line who described the terror and mayhem that erupted when the train bound for New York derailed, killing at least seven passengers and injuring dozens of others.
Richard Umbrino Jr. and Arthur Colombino, both of Point Pleasant, took the train back from a Florida vacation because they were afraid to fly.
After landing Wednesday evening at Newark International Airport with four other survivors, the two men described bodies and glass flying about the train as it crashed. Umbrino said one of the men killed was seated just ahead of him.
“His leg was twisted around, he was bleeding from his head and chest, and I think his lungs were punctured,” said Umbrino, a 20-year-old junior at Kean College in Union.
Umbrino and other survivors contested claims that the train was below the 79 mph speed limit, saying that few on board could sleep because the train was moving so fast.
“The train was bouncing so much that’s why I woke up,” he said.
Cepeda, an obstetrician-gynecologist who is planning to move to Florida shortly, was not in the mood to be passive Wednesday night. While other weary survivors boarded trains in Washington to head north, he flatly refused, insisting that Amtrak find him another way of getting home.
“If they don’t put me on a plane I’ll find my own,” he insisted.
Cepeda was not the only survivor frightened of getting back on a train.
Thirteen-year-old Kim Williams of Brigantine, who was returning from a visit to relatives in Florida and traveling with her aunt, was flushed and clearly nervous as she followed directions from Amtrak personnel guiding her to a train headed north.
“It was very scary and I don’t know if it’s going to happen again,” she said. “I haven’t been able to eat all day because I’m afraid it’s going to happen again.”
Never on an airplane before Wednesday, Umbrino said flying would probably be his mode of long-distance travel from now on.
“I’m not going to be traveling on trains anymore,” he said. “Today was my first flight, and I liked it.”
Record Staff Writer John Mooney contributed to this article.

Keywords: NEW JERSEY; RAILROAD; SOUTH CAROLINA; ACCIDENT; DEATH; DISASTER; NEWARK; VICTIM; FLORIDA

Caption: PHOTO – RIC FRANCIS / THE RECORD – Richard Umbrino Jr., 20, left, and Arthur Colombino, 19, were among six survivors to arrive at Newark Airport on Wednesday.

ID: 17351241 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

August 1, 1991
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SETTLEMENT IN WORKS FOR JAIL OVERCROWDING LAWSUIT

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, July 25, 1991

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

A 1988 federal lawsuit seeking to reduce overcrowding and improve conditions at the Bergen County Jail is nearing a settlement, the state Public Advocate Department says.
“We still have to fine-tune it,” said Audrey Bomse, an attorney for the agency, which represents the inmates. “I would say it’s a matter of months.”
Murshell Johnson, assistant Bergen County counsel, declined to discuss the case.
Patricia Leuzzi, special assistant to Attorney General Robert J. Del Tufo and the lawyer representing the state in the lawsuit, acknowledged that the inmate population and jail conditions were two major topics in the ongoing talks.
The October 1988 lawsuit, filed by the Office of Inmate Advocacy and nine inmates, charged that overcrowding at the jail creates conditions that make it unfit for human habitation and violates inmates constitutional rights.
Bergen County contended during hearings in 1990 that the conditions were not inhuman and that the New Jersey Corrections Department was responsible for the overcrowding. More than 300 of the jail’s roughly 1,000 inmates should be housed in a state prison, Bergen County lawyers charged.
In two recent letters to the state Corrections Department, Bergen County Sheriff Jack Terhune warned that an overload of state inmates was making the county jail unmanageable. Under a state executive order signed in 1981 and renewed every six months since, Bergen County must take 72 state inmates. About 425 inmates now in the jail are state prisoners.
Recently, inmates were put in disciplinary “lockdowns” following a food fight and a separate gang attack.

Keywords: BERGEN COUNTY; PRISON; LAWSUIT; NEW JERSEY; GOVERNMENT

ID: 17350593 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

July 25, 1991
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BERGEN JAIL CROWDING IS LAID TO STATE

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By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, July 11, 1991

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

Bergen County Sheriff Jack Terhune is warning the state Corrections Department that an overload of state inmates is making the county jail unmanageable.
“We have an authorized capacity of 423 between the annex and the main jail, and we run 230 to 240 percent above that, consistently,” Terhune said in an interview Wednesday.
“Now, when you take human beings and you put them in smaller space than was designed for them, you are going to have the potential for violence, the potential for problems.”
Terhune, who said he recognized the state’s prison overcrowding problem, wants some state prisoners removed from his jail.
County jails are supposed to house anyone sentenced to a term of 364 days or less, with those sentenced to a year or more going to a state prison. Of the jail’s population of 966, 429 belong in a state prison, Terhune said. The jail population often swells to more than 1,000 on weekends, he added.
Under a state executive order signed in 1981 and renewed every six months since, Bergen County must take 72 state inmates.
“We get $45 a day to keep state inmates here,” Terhune said. “The cost to the taxpayers of Bergen County is $63 to keep them, so we are losing money. People think we make money off this thing. We don’t.”
The sheriff has written two letters to Corrections Commissioner William H. Fauver expressing his concerns. A spokeswoman said Wednesday that the state removed 10 inmates following Terhune’s first letter in May and plans to remove 30 more this week.
Inmates in two Bergen County Jail annex cell sections were disciplined in a “lockdown” during the weekend following a food fight in one cell section and a gang attack on an inmate in the other. Overcrowding contributed to both incidents, Terhune said, adding that most of those involved were state inmates.
Fauver is aware of the overcrowding problem in all county jails, said Patricia Mulcahy, a Corrections Department spokeswoman, but the 15 state prisons with 23,518 inmates are running an average of 130 percent over capacity. About 3,400 state inmates are in county jails, with some of the jails running 300 percent to 400 percent over capacity.
To alleviate some of the problem, the state will take over the vacant 300-bed Hudson County Correctional Facility in Secaucus, with the first 100 beds available Monday, Mulcahy said. She said she did not know whether any beds would go to county jail inmates.
A 1988 lawsuit brought against Bergen County on behalf of jail inmates seeking relief from overcrowding, among other issues, is being negotiated for a possible settlement. None of the parties in the suit would comment on it this week.

Keywords: BERGEN COUNTY; PRISON; POPULATION; NEW JERSEY

ID: 17349186 | Copyright © 1991, The Record (New Jersey)

July 11, 1991
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