2 HAWTHORNE TEENS STILL IN HOSPITAL INJURED IN WEATHER-RELATED CRASH

By Michael O. Allen and Gregory Beals, Record Staff Writers | Wednesday, March 18, 1992

The Record (New Jersey) | 4 Star | NEWS | B03

Two Hawthorne teenagers remained hospitalized from injuries in what police say was a weather-related, head-on collision in the village last week.

Edward Mullins III, 17, the driver of one of the cars, was in fair condition at Hackensack Medical Center on Tuesday, a spokeswoman said.

His passenger and classmate at Hawthorne High School, Corinne Dockray, 14, was in stable condition in the surgical intensive care unit with head injuries at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark, a spokesman said. A helicopter took Dockray to the hospital after the accident on March 11, police said.

Two of Mullins other passengers, and the driver of the other car and her passenger, suffered minor injuries. Treated at The Valley Hospital in Ridgewood and released were Patrick Murphy, 17, and Allison Taylor, 14, both of whom were riding in Mullins car; Judith M. De Boer, 42, the driver of the other car; and Kirk De Boer, whose age and relationship to Judith De Boer were unavailable.

Murphy and Mullins have been friends since the age of 7, when they began playing football together, said Theresa Murphy, mother of Patrick Murphy. Both are members of the Hawthorne High School football team. Mullins is a halfback, Murphy an outside linebacker.

Murphy suffered a few abrasions to the face and required a few stiches, his mother said, adding that he was in shock after the accident and was deeply concerned about Mullins.

“It was very upsetting,” said Theresa Murphy, a 17-year Hawthorne resident. “He didn’t go to school for two days. He’s been at his buddy’s all the time.”

Mullins father, Edward Mullins, said: “My family, my friends, and my faith have kept me going. We are very, very positive right now.”

Students at Hawthorne High School have been kept advised of the condition of their injured classmates. One student said announcements have been made over the public address system.

Mullins had been traveling eastbound on Godwin Avenue about 6:45 p.m. last Wednesday when his car moved into the path of oncoming traffic and struck De Boer’s car at a bend in the road, according to the police report.

Ridgewood Police Capt. Louis Mader on Tuesday attributed the accident to the weather, saying it had snowed and there was a patch of ice in the roadway where the accident occurred.

Richard Sperito, the assistant superintendent of schools in Hawthorne, said: “Unfortunately, I think a lot of times when this happens we say, `Oh, they were speeding, or `Oh, they were drinking. But that was not the case here. It could have happened to you or me.”

Correction: Allison Taylor, one of the six Hawthorne residents injured last week in an accident in Ridgewood, remained in the hospital Friday and was in good condition, a hospital spokeswoman said. A story in Wednesday’s editions said she had been released from the hospital. Also, the name of one of the injured was misspelled. She is Corin Dockray. (PUBLISHED, SATURDAY, MARCH 21, 1992, PAGE a02.)

SPECTATOR SEATS AREN’T ALL NEEDED BUT PRESS OVERFLOWS COURTROOM

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

ROBBERY VICTIM PURSUES SUSPECTS

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Sunday, January 5, 1992

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

There was no smooth getaway for two Bronx men Saturday afternoon when they encountered a jeweler who chased them after the pair held up his store at gunpoint, Police Chief William Luciano said.

Officer Emma Jackson was patrolling the business district about 3 p.m. when she saw the owner of Goldfinger Jewelry Store running after two men on West Palisade Avenue.

“They just robbed my store, at gunpoint,” said the owner, whom police declined to identify. Jackson radioed headquarters for backup and followed the men in her patrol car.

Eight patrol cars raced to the area and chased the pair through McKay Park, into a nearby brook, and through back yards on Elmore Avenue, where police arrested them, Luciano said.

James Cornick and Lamonte Hampton were being held in the Englewood Police Department lockup Saturday night, awaiting a bail hearing, he said.

They were charged with armed robbery and illegal possession of handguns for unlawful purpose.

“You know the old saying: `You can run but you can’t hide’?” a jubilant Luciano asked later. “Too many blue uniforms, too many cops for them to get away. ”

For Jackson, a 16-year veteran of the department, it was the second chase in about two weeks. A robbery victim stopped Jackson’s car as she drove past a bar on West Street and, gesturing because he could not speak English, told her to follow a car occupied by four men he claimed had just robbed him.

The suspects abandoned the car and escaped on foot after crashing into Jackson’s patrol car at a traffic light.

Saturday’s suspects were not so lucky, Luciano said. Patrolman Timothy Torell chased Cornick, who was seen coming out of the window of a home on Elmore Avenue, in the direction of Lt. James Crowley, who arrested him.

Patrolman Joseph Archer saw Hampton about 100 feet down the street, walking at a leisurely pace, Luciano said. The store owner identified him later as one of the men who came into his store and robbed him and his wife, the chief said.

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

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.

POLICE TAUGHT ABOUT ABUSE LAW

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, November 14, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | 5 Star | NEWS | Page B01

A police officer responds to a call about a woman’s screams. He arrives at the home where the screams were heard and is confronted by a man who tells the officer to leave. Nothing is amiss, says the man.

Should the officer break down the door or walk away?

Under the state’s Domestic Violence Prevention Act, which took effect Tuesday, the officer may decide to enter the home. Under the old law, he could not.

More than 150 officers from Bergen County were briefed Wednesday at a workshop on provisions of the new law, which places a burden on police to make arrests in domestic violence situations if they see injury or other evidence of battery.

“It’s a very pro-victim law,” said Paul Brickfield, Bergen County first assistant prosecutor. “If you have injuries, the defendant is going to be arrested, even when the victim is opposed to the arrest.”
Under the old law, police could not do anything if the victim declined to file a complaint. The new law, in effect, says police must file criminal and civil complaints against the person suspected of committing the violence, then arrest him or her.

Even as they welcomed the law, several officers Wednesday pointed out ambiguities that they say may hamper enforcement. River Edge Police Lt. Ron Starace, echoing a concern of many in the audience, said the new law appears to address obvious cases but not the gray areas where evidence of domestic violence is not apparent.

“There’s going to come a point in time when somebody is going to have to go inside that house,” Starace said. “The law, as it is now written, says we can’t walk away.”

Among other provisions, the law:

– Permits police to seize weapons at the scene of violence if they determine that they present a risk to the victim;

– Expands the definition of whom domestic violence law covers to include not just family or blood relations but also other people who live in the same household, including same-sex roommates, partners in a homosexual relationship, and people staying with a family though not related by blood;

– Requires a court order to rescind a restraining order, and mandates that police must arrest the person being restrained from the victim if they are found together, even in cases of apparent reconciliation.

In some areas, the law raises constitutional questions, Oakland Police Sgt. Robert Haemmerle said. He cited the provisions on the seizure of weapons and the forcible entry of a residence as two aspects that could pose constitutional problems.

Midland Park Police Chief Thomas Monarque advised officers to err on the side of caution and protect the victim by entering the house and seizing weapons. Monarque is a member of the county domestic violence working group that advises the prosecutor’s office on the issue.

“That’s what I would want my officers to do,” said Monarque. “We are in untried constitutional grounds here, but we also have protections built into the new law.”

The officer is protected under the law for any good-faith action taken to protect a victim in an area where the law mandates an arrest, Brickfield said.

“It’s always an emotional situation,” Brickfield said. “Usually, the victim wants the defendant out of the house, the defendant is surprised police are going to remove him from his home to take him to jail.”

As police officers in the county implement the law, the Prosecutor’s Office will address problems and issues when they develop, he said.

Also participating in the day-long workshop were Lucia Van Wettering, an assistant Bergen County prosecutor who handles domestic abuse cases; Mary Pillarella, team leader of the domestic violence intake unit at the Bergen County Superior Court, Family Court; and Gina Plotino of Alternative to Domestic Violence, a county counseling agency for victims and defendants in domestic violence cases.

Caption: 2 PHOTOS – AL PAGLIONE / THE RECORD 1 – Ridgefield Park policeman Frank Schwarz listening to 2 – Susan Kulik, an assistant Bergen County prosecutor, at a domestic violence workshop.

BOY, 15, DIES AFTER SNIFFING BUTANE IN CAR ELMWOOD PARK YOUTH PASSED OUT AT MALL

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Thursday, June 27, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A01

A 15-year-old Elmwood Park boy died Tuesday about an hour after he passed out while sniffing butane gas in the back seat of a friend’s car in Paramus, authorities said Wednesday.
Thomas Prokap was pronounced dead at 10:46 p.m. at Kennedy Memorial Hospitals at Saddle Brook, Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy said.
A spokeswoman for the Bergen County Medical Examiner’s Office said an autopsy Wednesday failed to determine the cause of death. Toxicology tests, which usually take six to eight weeks, will be performed, she said.
Prokap was in the friend’s car at Garden State Plaza with three friends, whom Fahy declined to identify because they are juveniles. The prosecutor said they began “hanging out” in the mall’s parking lot about 7:45 p.m.
Sometime after 9 p.m., they drove to a store on Main Street in Hackensack, where Prokap bought a 2 1/2-ounce canister of Ronson butane fuel, Fahy said.
The other youths told authorities that, as they had seen Prokap do on occasion within the past week, he inhaled butane from the spray top on the canister, Fahy said.
They said they noticed he was drooling and appeared to be sleeping. When they couldn’t wake him, they drove to the hospital, he said.
The youths were not drinking and there was no evidence of drugs in the car, Paramus Police Chief Joseph Delaney said. Police do not anticipate charging the youths with any crime at this point, he said.
The investigation points pending the medical examiner’s toxicology tests to the butane, Delaney said.
Elmwood Park Police Chief Byron Morgan II said that he has heard of teenagers using inhalants to “achieve a high,” but he knew of no other cases in which a local youth had used butane.
“Any accident like this is a tragedy, a little more so when it involves the life of a child or a teenager,” he said.
Dr. Joseph Boyle, an associate professor of physiology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in Newark, said butane causes excitement, exhilaration, and delirium when inhaled. He also said it could act as a depressant.
“They get intoxicated, similar to alcohol,” he said of users.
Butane also causes a condition known as hypoxia, a depletion of oxygen in the body tissue to a point where it cannot sustain life, he said. And it does not take inhalation of a large quantity of the gas for it to occur, he added.
Boyle said another effect of butane, a volatile organic substance, is an irregular heartbeat.
Residents in the tight-knit Elmwood Park neighborhood where Prokap lived spoke highly of his family, whose other two sons attend Rutgers University, and of Prokap, whom they described as a tall, lean, “good-looking” boy.
“They’re great people. I don’t understand what went wrong,” a neighbor said.
Prokap, who was a sophomore at Elmwood Park Memorial High School who died 22 days short of his 16th birthday, was a former member of the Elmwood Park Little League and St. Leo Boy Scout Troop 80.
Among his survivors are his parents, John and Gloria, and two brothers, John and Gordon, all of Elmwood Park.
Record Staff Writers Jim Consoli and Wendy Zentz contributed to this article.

Keywords: ELMWOOD PARK; PARAMUS; YOUTH; FUEL; ACCIDENT; DEATH; VICTIM; TEST

Caption: PHOTO – PETER MONSEES / THE RECORD – A can of Ronson butane fuel, which carries warning against inhalation.

HIT-AND-RUN VICTIM FROM LODI SUCCUMBS

MICHAEL O. ALLEN | Sunday, June 23, 1991

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

A 37-year-old Lodi man injured in a hit-and-run accident while crossing Market Street early Friday died in Hackensack Medical Center of multiple head injuries, a hospital spokeswoman said. Gary Merlo of Vreeland Avenue, Lodi, died at noon Saturday, the spokeswoman said.
A Saddle Brook police dispatcher Saturday confirmed the accident at the corner of Market Street and Rosemont Avenue sometime after midnight Friday, but said no more information was immediately available.
Bill Ramirez, Merlo’s brother-in-law, said witnesses at a nearby bar saw a jeeplike truck or four-wheel-drive vehicle hit Merlo as he crossed the street after leaving a nearby diner.

Keywords: DEATH; VICTIM; MOTOR VEHICLE; ACCIDENT; SADDLE BROOK; LODI

Notes: Bergen page

KIDNAPPED MAN’S BODY FOUND

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, June 15, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A01

A 55-year-old Fort Lee man kidnapped earlier this week was found shot to death in the trunk of his car at LaGuardia Airport, authorities said.
Ralph DeSimone Jr. of 1516 10th St. was last seen leaving Brushless Car Wash at 1620 Bergen Blvd., where he was a manager, about 3 p.m. Wednesday, Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy said. His family received a call demanding $150,000 ransom later that afternoon.
DeSimone, whose body was found late Thursday afternoon, was shot three times in the head and twice in the back, authorities said. He was hog-tied and had a plastic bag over his head.
The FBI is investigating whether DeSimone was involved with organized crime, Special Agent William Tonkin said. The Associated Press reported that New York police said DeSimone was a Gambino family associate.
“The motivation for the kidnapping is not known yet,” Tonkin said. “There are several avenues of investigation. Certainly, an organized-crime link will be pursued.” DeSimone had served a 10-year sentence, beginning in 1976, on federal drug charges, authorities said.
No witnesses to the kidnapping have come forward, Fort Lee Police Chief John Orso said. The ransom call came into the car wash, owned by DeSimone’s son, Anthony, about 4:45 p.m. Wednesday, Fahy said.
“We’ve got Ralph, and if you want to see him alive, come up with $150,000,” Fahy said a male voice told a car wash employee.
The family waited in vain for information on where to pay the ransom, Orso said. They called Fort Lee police at about 9:30 p.m. to report the kidnapping and the ransom demand, he added.
An FBI all-points bulletin led Port Authority police to DeSimone’s white-and-red 1984 Oldsmobile Cutlass in a long-term parking lot at the airport at about 6:30 p.m. Thursday, a New York City police spokesman said.

Keywords: FORT LEE; MAN; KIDNAPPING; VICTIM; SHOOTING; MURDER; RALPH DeSIMONE JR

MOTHER, 3 CHILDREN DIE AS FIRE DESTROYS HOME

By Michael O. Allen and Laura Impellizzeri, Record Staff Writers | Wednesday, June 12, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | Three Star P | NEWS | Page A18

After being driven back twice by heavy smoke and intense heat, a disoriented William McClain could do nothing but scream for help as a raging fire destroyed his home and family early Tuesday.
Four members of the family the mother, a daughter, and two sons died in the two second-floor bedrooms as a result of the 12:30 a.m. blaze at 86 Haring St. in Bergenfield.
The youngest child, Patrick, 7, was in “extremely critical condition” Tuesday evening at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Paterson, Bergen County Prosecutor John J. Fahy said.
Firefighters found Lelia McClain, 39, unconscious in bed upstairs in the master bedroom. Katie, 9, was found unconscious on the floor in that room. The mother died at 5:30 a.m. at Hackensack Medical Center, a hospital spokeswoman said. Katie was admitted to Englewood Hospital in critical condition, and died before dawn.
The two oldest sons William “Billy” McClain, 16, and Brian, 13 were found, with Patrick, huddled in the northwest corner of their bedroom, said Lt. Robert Kops, chief of the prosecutor’s arson investigation unit. They were dead on arrival at Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck.
Kops said the fire started in the kitchen, in the southwest corner of the house, spread into the dining and living rooms, and sent a thick wall of smoke and intense heat up the stairs. The heat and a black haze apparently prevented the father from crossing the tiny upstairs hallway to the children’s bedroom when he heard one of them yell “fire,” Fahy said.
The house was gutted. Tuesday afternoon, its powder-blue siding, though melted and bent around the charred kitchen window, was still mostly intact, hiding the devastation within.
Bergenfield Deputy Fire Chief Edward Kneisler said there was no smoke detector in the 75-year-old house, where the McClains had lived since 1977. The alarms are not required.
“When we got there it was fully involved,” he said. “A $20 smoke detector in this house and it might have saved someone’s life.”
Kneisler said about 30 Bergenfield firefighters, with standby support from Dumont, Closter, and Tenafly, extinguished the blaze in about 30 minutes.
Bergenfield Police Officer Pete Murphy said he was in the area about 12:35 a.m. Tuesday on an unrelated investigation when he heard someone screaming.
Murphy said that when he turned the corner at West Clinton Avenue onto Haring Street, black smoke blanketed the whole block. He found McClain, 39, sitting on the first-floor porch’s roof, which forms a sloped ledge outside his bedroom window, screaming that his family was trapped inside. Murphy said he could not talk him into jumping from the roof.
Murphy and Bergenfield Police Officer Owen M. Rynn, who is also a volunteer firefighter, tried to go into the house.
“We kicked in the front door,” Murphy said. “We got into the living room, about halfway through, but the smoke was too thick and the heat.”
“We came out and it went up,” said Rynn. He could see flames in the kitchen as he crawled several feet into the living room beneath the acrid, knee-level smoke.
Neighbors Peter Field, 23, and Matt Gelis, 21, rushed over with a ladder when they heard McClain shouting, and saw smoke billowing out of the house.
“The father was on the roof and my first reaction was to grab the ladder and help him down,” said Gelis, who has known the family since the younger children were babies.
“It’s horrifying,” Gelis said. “You’re just sitting there, and you can’t get in the house and you’re just waiting for firefighters.”
The police helped McClain from the roof. Field and Gelis brother Jason ran to the back of the house yelling the children’s names, but got no answer, the youths said. The police officers then climbed the ladder and tried to go into the master bedroom, but were again beaten back by the heat. Seconds later, firefighters arrived.
Murphy said McClain was suffering from shock and smoke inhalation and appeared to be “completely devastated.”
“I don’t know how this guy is going to make it,” Murphy said.
Fahy said the cause of the fire was not determined, but it did not appear suspicious. Neighbors said a planned two-room, one-story addition on the back of the house was nearing completion; Fahy said the work was not a factor in the fire.
Volunteer Bergenfield firefighter Jack DeLucia, who drove the ladder truck that put out the blaze, returned to the scene about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, still shaken by the experience.
“If somebody could have seen the fire 10 minutes earlier,” DeLucia said. “It’s been said many times before, but smoke alarms, smoke alarms.”
Bergenfield Mayor Robert Gallione said the borough follows the state building code, which does not require that single-family dwellings have smoke detectors. The building department, however, began looking at ways to strengthen the codes earlier this year, he said.
“We will be getting a report regarding changes to be made,” Gallione said. “Any opportunity that we get to save just one life, we will take the appropriate action. We have relied on public education and voluntary compliance, with smoke suppression and smoke detection devices.
Record Staff Writers Tom Toolen and Linda Voorhis contributed to this article.

Keywords: FIRE; DEATH; VICTIM; BERGENFIELD; FAMILY

Caption: PHOTO – JOHN DECKER / THE RECORD – A shocked neighbor looking at house where four family members died.

Notes: 2 of 2 versions

BURGLARY SUSPECT MAY NOT HAVE DROWNED

By Michael O. Allen, Record Staff Writer | Saturday, April 20, 1991

The Record (New Jersey) | All Editions | NEWS | Page A04

A burglary suspect thought to have drowned after he leaped off a bridge into the Passaic River after a police chase may have escaped, police said Friday.
Police have developed new information that Herbert Pitts of 43 Graham Ave., Paterson, may have been seen running down a nearby highway ramp after the jump, police Lt. Ron Natale said.
“We combed the river thoroughly Wednesday and again yesterday,” Natale said. “We didn’t find any body. We are not absolutely positive that he did go into the river. We believe he may have, but there is a chance he did escape. Right now, we’ll continue on the assumption that Pitts is somewhere out there, possibly alive.”
A suspect in custody, Tyrone Jones, 28, of Paterson identified Pitts, 32, from a photograph as a suspect involved in the chase, which led to the drowning death of Terry Wilson, 25, also of Paterson.
The incident began Wednesday afternoon at the scene of a burglary in Hackensack. With Hackensack, Lodi, and Elmwood Park police pursuing, the suspects fled in a stolen van, weaving through traffic on Routes 46, 20, and 80 before crashing in the eastbound Route 80 lanes in Elmwood Park.
The men abandoned the van and ran across the highway, and Pitts and Wilson leaped 50 feet off the bridge into the river, near Market Street. Wilson’s body was later pulled from the river. Jones, who did not jump and was caught, was being held in the Bergen County Jail Annex on $100,000 bail.
Jones, charged by Hackensack police with 11 counts of theft, five counts of burglary, and one count each of receiving stolen property and resisting arrest, cooperated with investigators, giving them information on burglaries in Carlstadt, Fair Lawn, Maywood, Wyckoff, and other Bergen County communities.

Keywords: HACKENSACK; BRIDGE; BURGLARY; RIVER; MISSING PERSON; DEATH; VICTIM