Friday, May 18, 2012
Buckle up or get a ticket, says the state, which gave a slew of towns, including Woodbridge, $4,000 to enforce the law during the Memorial Day holidays.
- POLICE & FIRE
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5 hours ago
Beginning next week, law enforcement agencies throughout New Jersey will be cracking down on unbuckled motorists and their passengers as part of the annual “Click It or Ticket” campaign. Nearly 150 agencies, including Woodbridge, received $4,000 each to run the seatbelt enforcement checkpoints and saturation patrols, which will take place May 21 to June 3. The crackdowns come during the Memorial Day holiday weekend, one of the busiest times on the roads. According to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA), 22,187 passenger vehicle occupants were killed in motor vehicle crashes in 2010 and 51 percent of them were not wearing seat belts at the time of their fatal crashes. NHTSA statistics show that in 2010 alone, …
Thursday, May 17, 2012
If you notice your sloppy neighbor is suddenly using a new-found cache of gardening tools, this story might tell you where he got it all from.
It's that time of the year when you want to get out in the garden and get your hands dirty. That's just what some enterprising thieves did last week when they visited a Colonia home and purloined a slew of gardening gear. Woodbridge police said that the owner of a Neptune Place residence noticed this week that gardening tools kept in a shed in the rear of the home were missing. The thieves made off with several pairs of gardening gloves, trowels, cultivators, and clippers, all worth about $300. They also stole a $30 pair of noise reducing headphones, proving that even crooks want to protect their hearing when using power tools. There was no word whether the thieves stole someone else's lawnmower to go along with the noise reducing …
A lightning strike on a Dow Chemical plant in Bristol, Pa. Wednesday caused a wafting odor that traveled as far east as Woodbridge, reports say.
If you thought there was something in the air in Woodbridge Wednesday, you weren't alone. A lightning strike on two large chemical tanks at Dow Chemical in Bistol, Pa, yesterday caused a massive three-alarm blaze and a miasma began to waft across the Delaware into central New Jersey, Levittown Patch reported. The fire was brought under control shortly after 5 am, but the odor kept blowing across the Delaware for the rest of the day. One firefighter/policeman died at the scene of a heart attack, the story noted. Hazmat teams were also on the scene. Reports of the smell from the chemicals, used in the manufacture of acrylic paint products, from the Bucks Advance, said that the odor drifted as far into New Jersey as Woodbridge. A quick …
A lightning strike Wednesday was blamed for a three-alarm fire at Bristol Township, Pa. Dow Chemical Plant.
A lightning strike is to blame for a massive three-alarm blaze at the Dow Chemical facility at Route 413 and State Road in Croydon that destroyed two large tanks that held chemicals used in the manufacturing of acrylic paint products, according to local and county officials. No first responders were injured due to the blaze. But 63-year-old Dave Wintz, a fire police captain with the Bristol Fire Company, left the fire scene after feeling ill and later died of a fatal heart attack shortly before sunrise, Deputy Chief Francis Hufnell said. Firefighters and hazmat teams from Bucks, Montgomery and Burlington County in New Jersey responded shortly after 3:35 a.m. to the blaze and worked with Dow’s in-house emergency response fire and hazmat …
Friday, May 11, 2012
Two suspects were nabbed by police after they discovered a discarded cigarette butt at the scene of one of 100 vehicles broken into in November, 2011.
The DNA off a discarded cigarette broke the case of a rash of 100 vehicle break-ins in the Woodbridge area that took place in a single month last year. Frank Ferraro, 20, of Woodbridge and Michael North, 22, of Rahway were arrested last week on charges of allegedly breaking into 100 automobiles in November, 2011. A third individual, a juvenile who has not yet been apprehended, is in Florida. His whereabouts are unknown, said Woodbridge Police Captain Roy Hoppock. It was the DNA evidence Woodbridge police collected at the scene of one of the break-ins, Hoppock said, that nailed the perpetrators. The discarded cigarette butt was sent to the NJ State Police Crime Lab for processing. The suspect's DNA was already in the database, and they …
Thursday, May 10, 2012
The independent NJ Comptroller's Office, which 'targets waste, fraud, and abuse', settled into the fire house for six weeks to go over the books
The Woodbridge Fire Department is being audited by the NJ Office of the State Comptroller, and the fire commissioners say they have "no idea" why the state suddenly swooped down upon them. "We received word in early March that they were coming," said Todd Howell, president of the five member fire commissioner board for District 1, which covers Woodbridge Proper and Sewaren. "I don't know what it's all about. They didn't tell us what they were looking for." Howell said as many as four state auditors descended on the School Street firehouse and went over 'everything' for six weeks. "They called ahead of time and said they'd be here. We supplied them with whatever documentation they are looking for," Howell said. That encompassed "paperwork …
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Woodbridge Fire Department
418 School St, Woodbridge, NJ
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Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Police said a local woman was flimflammed out of almost $1,400 by trying to help her sister in another country
A Fords woman was a victim of an email scam that cost her almost $1,400. Woodbridge police said that the woman received an email Sunday morning from her sister, who said she was in the Philippines, she had been mugged, and she needed money to get home. The Fords woman, afraid for her sister's safety, immediately wired $1,100 through Western Union to her sibling. A short time later, the Fords woman received another email from her sister, asking for more money. The sister wired another $264 to the Philippines. She tried to call her sister several times Sunday without getting an answer. She told police she thought that since her sister had been mugged, the crooks had probably stolen her cell phone as well as other items. Monday morning, …
Guillermo Santamaria of Perth Amboy was convicted Monday of multiple counts of sexual assault against a student
A Perth Amboy middle school teacher was convicted Monday in Middlesex County Superior Court of sexually assaulting a female student over a five-year period, beginning when she was 13 years old. Guillermo Santamaria, 58, who also lives in the city, was found guilty of aggravated sexual assault, two counts of sexual assault, and two counts of official misconduct, including a charge that he had sex with the student on school property after she turned 18 years old. He faces a prison term of up to 30 years in jail when he is sentenced on September 28. The jury deliberated about two hours in New Brunswick on May 7 before finding Santamaria guilty on all five counts. Following the conviction, Santamaria’s $250,000 bail was revoked and he was …
Monday, May 7, 2012
Ki Song of Matawan admitted to never examining patients who paid cash for Xanax prescriptions he dispensed in a Woodbridge parking lot
A former doctor from Matawan was sentenced today for writing Xanax prescriptions for $100 payments in a restaurant parking lot on Route 1 in Woodbridge. Ki I. Song, 70, of Matawan, was sentenced to three years of probation by Superior Court Judge Bradley J. Ferencz in Middlesex County. He was also ordered to pay a $5,000 fine and to serve 150 hours of community service. His sentence was based on his March 13 guilty plea to third-degree dispensing of a contolled dangerous substance. Song admitted in Superior Court in March that on June 1, 2010 and March 19, 2011, he wrote prescriptions for Xanax in a Woodbridge parking lot in return for $100 without examining the recipient of the prescription. He was indicted for the crimes by a state …
Thomas Deschaine, 24, is under arrest in Pennsylvania and has outstanding warrants in Middlesex County as well, the Express-Times reports.
An Avenel man was arrested for breaking into a Pennsylvania home and making off with cash, jewelry and electronics last week. Thomas Joseph Deschaine, 24, of Avenel, allegedly broke into a Plainfield Township house, according to the Express-Times. In the story, police said Deschaine, who is also wanted on an active warrant in Middlesex County, allegedly stole an iPad, a laptop, jewelry and $300 in cash. The Express-Times story reported that police found a vehicle matching the description of the one near the robbery scene in Forks Township, also in Pennsylvania. Deschaine admitted the robbery and is being held in lieu of $50,000 bail in Northampton County Prison. Read more on the Express-Times....
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6:22 am on Friday, May 18, 2012
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