Posts Tagged ‘New Jersey’
Copper sues deli over bagel sandwich seasoned with body hair
A police officer is suing a New Jersey delicatessen and its cook, who admitted stuffing body hair into the officer’s bagel sandwich in revenge for a traffic arrest.
The lawsuit filed by Patrolman Jeremy Merck of the Evesham, New Jersey, Police Department seeks unspecified damages from Good Foods to Go in Marlton, New Jersey, and its cook, Ryan Burke…
Merck ordered an egg, cheese and turkey bagel and after eating part of it, he found it “was adulterated with pubic, chest or other human hair,” the lawsuit said.
Merck sought medical help and was checked for communicable diseases at a hospital, his attorney, Bruce Zamost, said on Friday. None was detected.
Burke, who served Merck the sandwich, was later charged with aggravated assault, retaliation against a public servant and food tampering. He ultimately served 15 days in jail.
According to a police report from the criminal case, “Burke admitted to tearing out hairs from his chest and his pubic area and placing them on Ptl. Merck’s sandwich out of anger due to the fines and lawyers fees he had from the prior arrest in 2009…”
A woman who answered the phone at the headquarters of the restaurant chain declined to comment on reports Burke was fired after the sandwich incident. The restaurant’s lawyer, Mark Sander, could not be reached for comment…
Har.
I’m never surprised over what people will do for retaliation – nor am I ever surprised by how often these dodos are caught after choosing to do something truly stupid.
Transgender worker files discrimination suit over firing
A transgender employee hired to oversee urine tests administered to men has filed a discrimination lawsuit against a Camden drug treatment center that fired him after it confronted him about his gender last summer…
When his employer asked about his gender after he began work, El’Jai Devoureau responded, “I am a man, and I can do the job. They said, ‘You’re fired.’”
According to the lawsuit, Devoureau, of Gloucester County, was hired in June to observe men depositing urine in cups for drug analysis. The supervision is to assure that the sample is fresh and not from a different person. The employer may require male workers for such a job, Michael Silverman of the Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund said.
In documents filed in January, after Devoureau filed a discrimination complaint with the state, the treatment center stated that it fired Devoureau because he was not a biological male. But it disputed that the termination was discriminatory…
After Devoureau began work, according to the lawsuit, an acquaintance recognized him and passed along to supervisors that Devoureau was physically female at birth and was transgender.
A day later, the lawsuit alleges, Devoureau was confronted by the program’s director, identified as Van Macaluso. She allegedly told Devoureau that he was fired because she had been told “he was not a man, that he did not have the parts of a man, and that the job called for a biological male,” according to legal documents…
“New Jersey is a national leader in transgender equality, and New Jersey is a worldwide model in protecting transgender people from discrimination,” Steven Goldstein, chairman of the civil rights organization Garden State Equality, said Monday.
“We’ve never seen or heard of such a brazen disregard for the law,” he said.”
New Jersey law recognizes Mr. Devoureau as male – hence his driver’s license. The U.S. government recognizes Mr. Devoureau as male – his Social Security account identifies him as such. Following the guidelines from New Jersey, Georgia changed his birth certificate to read “male”. As far as employment law in the United States is concerned – Mr. Devoureau is a man.
All other discussion pivots on whether a court of law should allow an employer to discriminate on the basis of their subjective viewpoint – not the law. I would hope the law prevails.
Drugs sent to jail in coloring book paint for “Daddy”
Three inmates and their loved ones were charged with attempting to smuggle drugs into a New Jersey jail on the pages of a children’s coloring book…
The drug, Subozone, normally used to treat heroin addiction but itself classified as a controlled dangerous substance, was dissolved into a paste and then painted into the coloring book, said Cape May County Sheriff Gary Schaffer. Pages with “To Daddy” scribbled on top were sent to the prisoners at the jail in Cape May, New Jersey.
“I’ve been in law enforcement for 38 years, and I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Schaffer…
Charged in the case were prisoners Zachary Hirsch, Charles Markham and Paul Scipione. Also charged were Markham’s mother, Debbie Longo, of West Wildwood, New Jersey, and Katelyn Mosbach, of Trevose, Pennsylvania, who was still being sought.
The New Jersey drug bust was the second one this month involving Suboxone smuggling behind bars.
Authorities at a prison in Carbon County, Pennsylvania earlier this month arrested 11 people in what they said was a scheme to hide the drug beneath postage stamps on letters mailed to inmates from family members.
Hey, with nothing but time on their hands would you expect a slammer full of junkies to be inventive about anything other than getting drugs inside?
Who’s in charge of computer security for the state of New Jersey?
An audit of New Jersey state computers to be sold at public auction found that the vast majority of the machines’ hard drives had not been erased.
A report just released…said officials had discovered computers containing child-abuse reports, health records, Social Security numbers, and a state judge’s confidential memoranda and tax returns….
State rules require agencies to erase data from decommissioned computers before sending them to other agencies or to be auctioned to the public. The computers examined in the audit came from courts, the Department of Health and Senior Services, the Office of Administrative Law, and the Department of Children and Families.
Here’s the part I really love -
Employees from an unidentified state agency told auditors that they were reluctant to sweep the hard drives because the necessary equipment was noisy and they feared the magnetic fields it generated…
The audit followed the discovery in 2007 that employees at the warehouse where computers were stored before auction were selling parts as scrap and rigging the auctions. Five employees were charged; four have pleaded guilty and were fired.
It is unclear how many computers moved through the warehouse. The comptroller’s office said it could identify 2,357 pieces of equipment, including desktop computers, laptops, and other items, that were distributed to other agencies. But it could not say how much equipment the warehouse had auctioned.
“That’s part of the problem. The record-keeping is very poor to nonexistent,” said Pete McAleer, spokesman for the office.
The other part of the problem is employees who fail to do their job for some of the dumbest reasons possible.
Thanks, Helen
Dumb Crook of the Day
Police say a Camden, New Jersey, man had the audacity to return to the jail where he posted a $400 bond with counterfeit bills, demanding a refund.
Ronald T. White was charged with shoplifting July 7, but his bail was incorrectly written up. When he found out, authorities say, he returned to the Cinnaminson, New Jersey, jail the following week to demand his money back…
According to Cinnaminson Police Chief Steven Fowler, the department issued a warrant for White’s arrest after his counterfeit bail posting of $400, but because he was a Camden resident, it was out of jurisdiction.
“Even though it was a $5,000 warrant for his arrest, they have bigger issues over in Camden, being the murder capital of the world,” Fowler said…
White had posted bail using at least two bills bearing identical serial numbers, police say, and the serial numbers also matched those on one of the bills found on him when he returned to the Cinnaminson jail to reclaim his extra $200…
On Thursday, at White’s first appearance in Superior Court, his bail was set at $7,500, because of outstanding charges from Camden County added on to the Burlington County charges…
In the meantime, until he can post bail with legitimate bills, he will be held at Burlington County Jail.
Not the world’s greatest counterfeiting job – walking around with identical serial numbers. And, yes, the coppers on duty weren’t too sharp about catching the funny money in time.
But, Ronald – wandering back to the pokey to get your refund ain’t the brightest thing you ever did.
New Jersey State Assembly approves medical marijuana
The New Jersey Assembly approved a measure on Monday that would make the state the first in the region and the 14th in the nation to legalize the use of marijuana for medical reasons.
The measure was to be voted on by the State Senate later in the afternoon, the final day of the legislative session. If passed, it would allow patients diagnosed with severe illnesses like cancer, AIDS, muscular dystrophy and multiple sclerosis to have access to marijuana distributed through state-monitored dispensaries…
Assemblyman Reed Gusciora, a Democrat from Princeton, said the New Jersey law would be the most restrictive in the nation because it would only permit doctors to prescribe it for a list of serious chronic illnesses. The legislation would also forbid patients from growing their own marijuana and using it in public, and it would regulate the drug under the strict conditions used to track the distribution of medically prescribed opiates like Oxycontin and morphine.
“I truly believe this will become a model for other states because it balances the compassionate use of medical marijuana while limiting the number of ailments that a physician can prescribe it for,” said Mr. Gusciora, who sponsored the bill…
In other words, New Jersey is still run by chickenshit politicians.
Opponents of the New Jersey bill often use California’s experience as a cautionary tale, saying that medical marijuana is so loosely regulated there that the state has essentially decriminalized the drug. Under California law, residents can legally obtain marijuana to treat a list of maladies as common, and undefined, as anxiety or chronic pain…
As the legislators prepared to vote on the measure, more than a dozen chronically ill patients rallied at the State House to urge lawmakers to pass it.
I sincerely wonder if any NJ legislators considered any of the studies on the usefulness of medical marijuana, the absurdity of continuing current criminal practices – or did they just rely on the advice of their friendly neighborhood wardheelers?
Ex-prosecutor charged for murder, drugs and prostitution ring
Daylife/AP Photo used by permission
He used a restaurant in Newark, N.J., as a front for a cocaine-distribution network.
He traveled to New York City to oversee a $1,000-an-hour call-girl ring.
He had a witness killed in one drug case and hired a hit man to rub out another.
And he did it all out of his law office.
That’s the picture federal authorities have painted in a 39-count racketeering indictment charging prominent New Jersey defense lawyer Paul Bergrin with being the leader of a criminal enterprise that used violence, intimidation, and deceit to generate millions of dollars.
Bergrin, a former federal prosecutor, arraigned today with seven codefendants in U.S. District Court in Newark…
He was “no different than a street gangster,” added Gerald P. McAleer, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration office in New Jersey.
Both the DEA and the FBI worked the Bergrin case. In the months since the arrest, court papers have fleshed out their allegations.
Though the indictment includes one murder and one murder conspiracy, investigators contend that witnesses have linked Bergrin to at least three other homicides.
They also say Bergrin routinely bribed witnesses to win cases. And, they contend, when bribery wasn’t an option, he resorted to violence.
“No witness, no case” was the phrase he used repeatedly in his criminal-defense work, authorities say.
RTFA. Long, detailed resume of the corruption that someone charged with public responsibility for justice – may come to.
New Jersey law bans using GPS while driving – WTF?
It is already illegal to manually use a cell phone for texting or calling while driving in New Jersey. A state legislator has aimed at the next in-car distraction: GPS devices. Democratic Assemblyman Harvey Smith wants a ban on manually programming GPS devices while driving. You would need to pull over to input your destination, or have a voice-operated unit. Punishment otherwise would be a $100 fine.
Probably every single one of us has had to drive defensively around someone who was obviously not paying attention to their driving. At this point, the question in New Jersey is how many activities are they going to ban? And what makes a GPS unit worse than an MP3 player or those folks who drive with their knees while they eat?
Another Assemblyman, John Wisniewski, had proposed a blanket ban on distracted driving in 2006 but that was passed over in favor of the cell phone-specific ban. New Jersey also already has a law against careless driving, which carries a $100 fine and two points on your license. Smith’s proposed law would give New Jersey officers — Smith is an undersheriff — a specific behavior to target, but it all seems a bit scattershot in light of the copious distracting activities drivers engage in.
Next they’ll require you keep your GPS in the trunk – stop, park, open the trunk – then, you can use it.
Scabby the Rat wins free speech battle in New Jersey
Scabby the Rat may not have a word to say, but the large rodent-shaped balloon helped a labor union earn a free-speech victory before New Jersey’s highest court.
The seven justices ruled unanimously that the local union had a right to display its 10-foot-tall, black, rat-shaped balloon at a rally held outside a fitness center.
At issue was whether a township could enforce a ban on inflatable or portable signs and banners on public property. Lawrence Township police had levied a $100 fine against an official from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers because of Scabby.
The court concluded that while townships have a right to maintain an “aesthetic environment” and ensure public safety, its restrictions on expressive displays “do not justify a content-based restriction of non-commercial speech.”
“There is no evidence to suggest that a rat balloon is significantly more harmful to aesthetics or safety than a similar item being displayed as an advertisement or commercial logo,” wrote Justice John Wallace Jr.
As Jack London said, “After God had finished the rattlesnake, the toad, and the vampire, he had some awful stuff left with which he made a scab. A scab is a two-legged animal with a corkscrew soul, a waterlogged brain and…a backbone of jelly and glue. Where others have hearts, he carries a tumour of rotten principles…No man has a right to scab as long as there is a pool of water to drown his carcass in, or a rope long enough to hang his body with.”
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