7th murder of 2011 over weekend

Plainfield's 7th homicide of 2011 reported at 1348 West Front on Sunday.

 

A Plainfield Today reader advised around noon on Sunday that there was a fatality at 1348 West Front Street. Was later told the body of a male was discovered inside the building and that it was confirmed as a homicide.

I drove by mid-afternoon and saw the Union County Sheriff's crime scene unit at the multi-story apartment building near the corner of West Front and Johannis Place, across from the old Mack plant.

As of late afternoon I was unable to get more information except to be told that the original suggestion the victim had been shot would need to await the outcome of an autopsy slated for Monday.

Will post more as information becomes available.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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POP, Angels in Action set anti-violence rally for Saturday

Route of Saturday's march shown in red.

Stephen Hatcher, chair of the Plainfield chapter of Peoples Organization for Progress (POP0 advises that the group is being joined by Angels in Action for an anti-violence march and rally this Saturday.

The event will begin at Grant Avenue and West 3rd Street at 2:00 PM and proceed to the convenience store at West 3rd and Monroe, the site of the shooting death of Nelson Santos, Plainfield's fifth homicide of 2011.

Plainfield's fifth homicide of 2011 happened outside this convenience store.

A rally against the violence, with speakers, will be held at the site of the shooting, according to Hatcher. The rally will conclude at 4:00 PM. For more information, contact him at (908) 731-1518.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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Homicide No. 5 Monday evening

Convenience store at West 3rd and Monroe Avenue. (Google Maps)

A reader texted me of Plainfield's fifth homicide of 2011 at 7:22 PM, shortly after City Council President Annie McWilliams' press conference on Council support for Recreation broke up.

The owner of the corner store at West Third Street and Monroe Avenue was fatally shot in the chest. MORE INFO AT 11:00 PM: The shooting happened outside the store, and it appears the victim was not an employee, but an innocent bystander and not the intended target.

Corner store, site of 5th homicide of 2011. (Google Street View)

Motive and perpetrator's identity not known at this time.

We can at least be thankful that someone responsible has stepped up to the plate on the gun issue in the person of Shiloh Baptist Church's pastor, the Rev. Dr. Gerald Lamont Thomas (see here), who called together last week's summit on guns and gun violence.

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• Plainfield Today:  "Violence picks up in Plainfield after 4th homicide, gun summit"

-- Dan Damon [follow]

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Violence picks up in Plainfield following 4th homicide, gun summit

Following Plainfield's fourth homicide of 2011, violence has picked up across the city on Thursday.

A reader reports gunfire with a man wounded on Johnston Avenue, near North Avenue, at 12:20 AM Thursday morning. Police arrived very quickly, as did an ambulance and the wounded man was transported to hospital, as police took to searching the neighborhood.

This shooting came just hours after a summit on gun violence and how to deal with it was held at First-Park Baptist Church on Wednesday evening.

The summit, organized by Shiloh Baptist Church's pastor, the Rev. Dr. Gerald Lamont Thomas, drew a crowd of about 150, including religious leaders, elected officials and community activists, as well as Assemblyman Jerry Green, Council President Annie McWilliams and Union County Prosecutor Theodore Romankow. Plans are in the works for a followup to further organize a response to gunplay in the community, according to Councilors Adrian Mapp and Rebecca Williams, who were also in attendance.

Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs was noted by her absence, as well as Public Safety Director Martin Hellwig, and Councilors Bill Reid, Bridget Rivers and Vera Greaves.

The violence continued Thursday evening with reports of the following incidents, all before 11:00 PM --

• FIGHTS and report of a person with a gun at Netherwood Village on East Front Street;
  
  
• Male arrested for GUN POSSESSION, carrying two guns in the George Street/Garfield Avenue area;
  
  
• SHOTS FIRED at Liberty and West 3rd Streets, with callers reporting upwards of 20 shots heard; one bullet went into a home.

With Mayor Robinson-Briggs showing little recent interest in the hard work of developing a plan to attack the continuing gun violence, we can only be thankful that Pastor Thomas organized the summit and is willing to take the lead in mobilizing the community.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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BREAKING: Third homicide of 2011 reported

UPDATE MONDAY PM: Am now told the victim was a roomer in an illegal boardinghouse, and that friends persuaded the police to break in after he was not seen or heard from for two days. 

Plainfield's third homicide of 2011 is being reported late Sunday evening. I am told the body of an Hispanic male was found in a house at 316 East Front Street. His throat had been slashed, I am told.

This follows the killing of 16-year-old Shawne Lovely on John Street overnight Saturday, as well as a shooting on Berckman Street at the railroad underpass.

The Courier has a story up about tonight's discovery (see here).

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• Courier:  "Plainfield authorities investigate third homicide of 2011" 
  

-- Dan Damon [follow]

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Two anti-violence events in Plainfield this weekend

Sign at Cadogan memorial by People's Organization for Progress.

Plainfielders will have two opportunities on Saturday to express their concerns about violence in the community and suggestions about ways to deal with it.

Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs is organizing an 'emergency summit' according to a report on the Courier's Plainfield microsite (see here), set for 2:00 PM at Calvary Baptist Church, West 4th Street and Monroe Avenue. The mayor envisions the meeting to be essentially run by city youth, though officials have been invited to speak.

The People's Organization for Progress will hold an anti-violence rally at the site of the Spencer Cadogan memorial on West Front Street near Clinton Avenue from 3:00 - 4:30 PM.

Both Bernice (see here) and Maria (see here) comment today on anti-gun efforts.

Maria uncovers the fact that Mayor Robinson-Briggs has signed on with the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Coalition (see here).

This is the group started a couple of years ago by New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg. Every news item in the NY metro media about this group since its inception has been duly included in the daily CLIPS links, along with comment noting that Mayor Robinson-Briggs (to that date) was not a participant.

So, the mayor goes and signs on and doesn't find it newsworthy? Leaving it for a blogger to uncover?

Only in Plainfield.

Memorial to Spencer Cadogan at site of slaying.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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BREAKING: Fatal shooting mid-afternoon Thursday

A 17-year-old was shot in the face shortly before 3 PM at West Front and Clinton.

A truant Plainfield High School student (the Courier identifies him as Spencer Cadogan -- 6:00 PM) was shot in the face shortly before 3:00 PM this afternoon at the corner of West Front Street and Clinton Avenue.

The 17-year-old was transported from the scene by the Plainfield Rescue Squad to the Muhlenberg SED, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.

I am told police are treating the shooting as gang-related.

I happened to be in the area taking photographs at the time and was asked by a police officer if I had seen 'a guy in a  blue jacket'. Plainfield and Union County police responded to the area, blocking off the crime scene and diverting traffic to Myrtle Avenue.

An undercover police vehicle was seen patrolling the paths in Green Brook Park looking for the suspect and three police vehicles were parked along the road near the park's playground.

After being chased away by a female cop who said, 'You don't look like family to me, so you'll have to leave', I learned that police were at the parking lot across from Muhlenberg, interviewing those who showed up at the hospital.

A resident phoned as I am writing this to say that a State Police helicopter is reconnoitering the area.

This is the sixth homicide in 2010.

Spoke with Mark Spivey, who was on his way to the scene. Look for further news on the Courier website later.

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-- Dan Damon [follow]

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Update: Is 'pedestrian' fatality homicide #3?

Updating Plainfield Today's post yesterday that a pedestrian was run over and killed on East Front Street Friday evening, it appears possible the incident may be Plainfield's third homicide of 2009.

Word in the street is that the male was pushed into the path of the vehicle which struck him, and that two men fled the scene on foot.

As details emerge, I wonder if my hunch that the victim may have been Hispanic and the victim of a mugging gone awry -- by individuals who may NOT have been Hispanic -- will be proven correct or mistaken. And whether the public will be given all the details.

If correct, would that make this a homicide? The city's third for 2009?

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-- Dan Damon

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Sharon's Shocking Secret: Plainfield Murder Rate up 25% in '08

Plainfield Mayor Sharon Robinson-Briggs went to great lengths in her 'State of the City' address last Thursday to brag about crime reduction in Plainfield during her tenure -- citing a decline in homicides from the high of 15 in 2005.

That high number had been a key theme in Robinson-Briggs' mayoral campaign that year against incumbent Al McWilliams.

But Robinson-Briggs failed to share her shocking secret with the audience at the annual reorganization meeting -- Plainfield homicides increased by 25% in 2008 as compared to 2007.

Here are the details --

2008 Homicides	2007 Homicides
Jan - Ahmed Crittenden, South 2nd St. May - Shakir Ali-Muslim, 5th & Park Sep - Quran Carter - W. 3rd & Monroe Nov - Belinda Williams - Liberty Street Dec - Dennis Gaitan - Watchung near Front	Mar - Bukhtiar Katchi, innocent bystander Mar - Joseph Tremarco, killed in scrap yard May - Keeasha Dickson, shot by ex-boyfriend Nov - Lazaro Pista, bias murder by 3 men

GRADE:

ITEM	GRADE	COMMENT
State of City Address: Homicides	F	Failed to compare 2008 to 2007.

Robinson-Briggs will be graded on an item-by-item basis, and a permanent 'Report Card' will be available for all to see here.

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-- Dan Damon

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Guns and violence on everyone's mind

With EIGHT homicides in Newark in the first 13 days of the year and Dr. Martin Luther King's struggle for nonviolent social change being honored tomorrow, violence and its aftermath is on everyone's mind.

The prevalence of guns, the turf fights in the drug world and the youth of those involved are focusing people's attention. Two deaths yesterday brought Newark's total so far this year to EIGHT (read more...) in the year's first thirteen days.

Former attorney general John Farmer, Jr. argues in an OpEd in today's Ledger that it was all predictable -- based on what he calls our misguided criminal justice policies (read more...). This Thursday, Harvard prof and psychiatrist Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint will speak at the Newark Public Library about this deadly crisis (read more...).

In Somerset, Stanley Croughter, whose son was killed execution style, is starting New Jersey's first chapter of Parents of Murdered Children (read more...).

While Plainfield saw homicides in 2006 drop to ten after 2005's fifteen, we are anything but out of the woods. The under-reported prevalence of guns and gunplay, the relative youth of the shooters and the drug trade's flourishing presence in our city leave us in a vulnerable position.

You will want to read Farmer's thoughts on the matter, and consider making time to hear Dr. Pouissant at the Newark PL if possible.

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Newark Public Library
5 Washington Street
(973) 733-7793
Presentation at 6 PM, Reception follows.

Reservations for reception by January 16th.
More on Library's website.

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Help and support for homicide victims' families:

• Parents of Murdered Children, NJ Chapter
  Stanley Croughter, chapter leader
  email: stanley184@patmedia.net
  phone: (732) 227-1023 or (908) 458-7171
  
  
• Parents of Murdered Children, National
  email: natlpomc@aol.com
  phone: (888) 818-POMC
  
  
• Survivors of Murdered Children, Orange
  Beverley Henderson, Director
  email: echoes1@verizon.net
  phone: (973) 675-1199
  
  
• Mothers of Murdered Sons and Daughters, East Orange
  Christine Johnson, Founder
  phone: (973) 399-5029

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OpEd, SL: John Farmer, Jr.: "Rise in violent crime was predictable"

Dr. Alvin Poussaint: "In Newark for a King event, Harvard prof looks at deadly crisis"

Parents of Murdered Children: "Out of dad's pain, others get outlet for grief; Somerset man starting state's first Parents of Murdered Children chapter"

Newark Homicides: "Two separate murders raise Newark death toll to 8 in 13 days"


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