June 2, 2011
Posted in Uncategorized at 12:04 am by matuas
by Mathew Katz and Conrad Wilson
Thursday, April 7, 2011
CARBONDALE — The Carbondale police officer who committed suicide late last month was under investigation by the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office in a juvenile sex crime case and was scheduled to be interviewed by detectives the day after he died.
The Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office said it had been investigating allegations of a sexual nature, potentially with a minor. Carbondale Police officer Nino Santiago Sr. was a person of interest in the case, according to Arapahoe County Sheriff Grayson Robinson.
The Carbondale Police Department issued a press release on Wednesday, acknowledging the investigation, despite that on Monday police chief Gene Schilling told KDNK that he wasn’t aware of the allegations.
“Approximately two weeks prior to his death, officer Santiago personally notified police chief Gene Schilling that officer Santiago was under investigation by the Arapahoe County Sheriff with regard to an alleged domestic sexual assault approximately eight years ago,” according to the press release. “Officer Santiago denied any involvement. He further indicated that he had been scheduled for an interview with Arapahoe County detectives on Wednesday, March 23, 2011.”
Officer Santiago was on duty and in a police car when he killed himself in a parking lot between a school and church in Carbondale on March 22.
Robinson said the allegations, which came from a family member in Arapahoe County’s jurisdiction, date back from 2004 to 2008.
“We had not gone far enough in our investigation to determine the validity of the allegation,” Robinson said. “But it would have been allegations involving a juvenile potentially.”
Robinson said the investigation that began just a few months ago ended when Santiago killed himself.
Robinson said he couldn’t discuss details in order to protect the potential victim and the sheriff’s office had not been able to confirm or deny the allegation during the three-month investigation, which was in the preliminary stage.
Since the investigation was in process, no charges had been filed and Arapahoe County had not contacted the Carbondale Police Department, Schilling determined that Santiago would remain on the job during the investigation, according to the press release.
“With this release my hope is that the citizens of Carbondale can move forward,” reads Schilling’s statement.
Robinson said the department had not gathered enough evidence to press criminal charges and the investigation is now closed as a result of Santiago’s death.
Robinson said his office did not notify Carbondale police or the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office because of the early nature of the ongoing investigation.
Garfield County Sheriff Lou Vallario said his department was aware of the investigation on the morning Santiago killed himself because he had discussed it with Schilling.
“We hadn’t ruled it as a suicide and we were looking for answers,” Vallario said Wednesday. “I know for certain it was the chief because we were advised of the investigation that morning as a possible motive.”
In an interview with KDNK in his office Monday, Schilling denied any knowledge of the investigation.
“I don’t have anything that I know of from any law enforcement entities or anyone that I’ve been able to have anything that says that that’s occurring,” Schilling said. “I’ve heard the rumors, but I don’t have any concrete evidence from law enforcement, or otherwise, that that was in fact so.”
But in a follow-up interview Wednesday with KDNK News, Schilling said his response was in regards to being contacted by any outside law enforcement agencies about an investigation into Santiago.
“I can’t say that it felt dishonest or not,” Schilling said. “I can just tell you that there’s times I have to answer questions with what I’m able to. It may feel dishonest, but the nature of the answer was not meant to be dishonest. It was meant to be not divulging all the information that I have and there are many times I can’t do that.”
Carbondale Mayor Stacey Bernot said she knew there was an investigation into one of the officers prior to Santiago’s death. But she had no details.
Schilling told her it was only just allegations at the time and nothing to be concerned about. But now that the specific allegation has come to light, Bernot said the matter needs to be looked into.
“We all have a lot of questions that we need answers to,” Bernot said. “This is concerning to the community. We need to do our best to get answers to the questions and be able to move forward.”
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January 12, 2009
Posted in RW1 Class Stories tagged bike lanes, bike safety, brooklyn, manhattan, urban issues at 4:40 pm by matuas
As the summer was coming to a close, Alexander Toulouse and his father, Christopher were out a bike ride, one of the 8-year-old’s favorite pastimes. His father sped up to lead his son Alexander as they made the turn onto Boerum Place from Livingston Street in downtown Brooklyn.
Moments later, the boy was dead. Hit by a postal truck whose driver didn’t even see him.
Police didn’t charge the truck driver. Accidents between motorists and pedestrians, like the one that killed Alexander, are common at this Brooklyn intersection—one of the city’s worst. It’s a five-way whirlwind of cars, busses, and suddenly-stopping delivery trucks where two people have died in the past year and where 11 serious accidents occurred between 1995 and 2005.
Despite the dangers, New Yorkers are increasingly turning to their bikes as a cheaper, greener source of transportation. In fact, biking is up 35 percent this year, according to the Department of Transportation. At the same time, 23 cyclists died last yea the highest number in eight years. In New York State, about 25 percent of non-motorists who died in fatal highway accidents were cyclists—nearly double the national average, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Bike advocacy groups estimate that there are thousands of collisions resulting in injuries between cyclists and motorists in the state every year. Collisions are harder to track than fatal accidents, however, since many incidents go unreported.
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October 15, 2008
Posted in Uncategorized tagged bronx, food, health, hunts point, poverty at 3:17 pm by matuas
Divine Lipscomb refuses to shop for groceries in Hunts Point. The young father, who moved to the neighborhood two and a half years ago, was disgusted by the meat and produce in the only supermarket in the neighborhood, which he said is overpriced and often rotting.
“Their fresh veggies aren’t fresh,” said Lipscomb. “The meat is more grey than red.”
That’s why Lipscomb took at job as a health educator at Health Outcomes Through Peer Education, or HOPE, a drop-in health outreach center on Hunts Point Avenue created by Urban Health Plan. One of the group’s main focuses is to promote healthy eating habits in a neighborhood that has very poor ones.
Hunts Point has long had a nutritional deficit, despite being home to the country’s largest wholesale produce market. Finding fresh fruits, vegetables, and wholes grains among the neighborhood’s many fast food restaurants and bodegas has long been a challenge. Recently, however, several community groups have had enough and are starting initiatives to provide residents with healthier options, but in a neighborhood with more fried foods than veggies, many residents are apathetic over what they eat.
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October 6, 2008
Posted in RW1 Class Stories tagged education, hunts point at 11:49 am by matuas
Gianna Fornabaio, a short woman with large, bright eyes, may not look imposing, but she certainly sounds it to her fifth-grade class. As the students stare, gulping, at small note cards taped to their desk, she explains in a firm, booming voice how these tiny pieces of paper—their educational goals— would determine their education for the next few months.
“Do not lose these goals. Get to know them,” she said. “We are going to work, day in, and day out on each and every one of these goals, so that everyone achieves them.”
The pieces of paper are a cornerstone of PS 48’s educational strategy. At the beginning of the year, after an assessment by their teacher and conferencing with the child, teachers assign two specific goals to each of the school’s students: one for Math and one for English. Each goal is tailored to the student, encouraging them to strive to better their own skills, not merely to improve scores on a test.
“The goal cards were developed last year,” said Fornabaio. Everything is broken down and analyzed student by student to get their individual goals.”
Embracing a motto that calls their school “the Best School in the Universe,” teachers and administrators at PS 48 in Hunts Point have managed to transform a once-struggling school of over 1,000 students into a beacon of education in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods. Unlike many schools that teach to standardized tests, teachers at PS 48 are encouraged to implement a different philosophy: education and student engagement comes first, test-taking comes second.
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October 1, 2008
Posted in RW1 Class Stories tagged brooklyn, courts, crime, murder, Park Slope, trial at 3:06 pm by matuas
The handle of the knife used to stab a man to death in Park Slope last year held the DNA of both the deceased and his attacker, forensics experts told a Brooklyn jury yesterday.
Rebecca Mikulasovich, an expert in forensic biology with the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner testified in the murder trial of 30-year-old Antonio Bruno of Bushwick. She described the process by which her team of forensics scientists tested samples swabbed from the knife. A swab of the handle taken by the NYPD at the scene of the crime contained the DNA of both Bruno and William Rosario, the deceased.
A second swab, taken after Mikulasovich’s team received the knife, was inconclusive, she said.
“The NYPD’s swab tested negative for blood, but positive for other biological material, which could be tissue or skin cells from a hand,” she said. “William Rosario and Antonio Bruno contributed to a mixture of DNA on the handle.”
Bruno faces charges of second degree murder, first degree manslaughter, and fourth degree criminal possession of a weapon, all related to the stabbing death of Rosario on November 12 last year. According to court files, the incident occurred during a heated argument between the two men in front of 298 12th St. in Bushwick. Rosario was 26 when he died.
In morning session one other forensic expert from Mikulasovich’s team who had inspected the knife confirmed that DNA of both men was on it.
Forensic expert Melissa Smith, , said clothing worn by the men that was inspected at the scene came up with inconclusive results, except for Rosario’s jacket, which was stained with his own blood.
The defense does not deny that Bruno stabbed Rosario, but the specific circumstances surrounding the stabbing is at issue in the case.
The prosecution, led by Assistant District Attorney Samantha Magnani, has spent the lengthy trial, which has lasted nearly a year attempting to convince the jury that Bruno was the aggressor.
According to documents outlining prosecution’s version of events, Rosario was on his way home from a bowling alley with two of his children and some friends when he encountered Bruno, who got into an argument then threatened and attacked Rosario with the knife. Rosario’s family has corroborated these versions of events.
Ivan Vogel, Bruno’s defense attorney, said he didn’t think the DNA evidence presented yesterday helped the prosecution’s case.
“DNA evidence is all about whodunit,” he said. “We’re not denying the stabbing of a person, but it was done in self-defense. If he didn’t defend himself, he would have ended up dead.”
Vogel said there is evidence that Rosario and his friends were armed on the night in question.
“They were looking to cause serious injury to my client,,” he said, adding added that Rosario had escalated the initial argument, that his client tried backing away from Rosario and his friends, and that Rosario had both alcohol and angel dust in his system when he died.
He said that the two men did not know each other prior to the incident.
Vogel, whose short defense lasted only an afternoon called only one witness to bolster his version of the incident, Detective Alfredo Hidalgo of the NYPD’s 72nd precinct.
Hidalgo testified that while he was investigating the case, he interviewed an eyewitness named Ben Smith, who said that Rosario and two friends had bottles in heir hands. Vogel said that he will argued that these bottles were used as aggressive weapons.
Both sides of the trial will give their summations today.
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September 27, 2008
Posted in RW1 Class Stories tagged food, hunts point, immigration at 11:33 am by matuas
José Francisco Ortega can still remember the smell of the tomato sauce he made at the Italian restaurant where he first worked as a dishwasher and later as a chef.
Nowadays, Ortega, a Mexican immigrant who arrived in New York in the eighties, makes his own sauces—and dishes—at Real Azteca, an often-teeming restaurant on East 163rd Street in Hunts Point that he started nearly decade ago with his brothers, Carlos and Javier.
“I don’t like the food of other restaurants,” said Ortega. “I make the Mexican meal, the same as my mom.”
Real Azteca Restaurant serves sumptuous Mexican dishes to a diverse clientele.
Ortega’s story is common in this South Bronx neighborhood. Mexican immigrants, once a rare sight in Puerto Rican-dominated Hunts Point, are on the rise in the area. As more Mexicans moved into the community in the past decade, they’ve demanded their own food, and entrepreneurs like Ortega responded by opening traditional Mexican restaurants. Today, eateries like Real Azteca and Pedro Food provide a rallying point for the Mexican community and its culture. But the restaurants also serve up an effective way to help improve relations with other ethnic groups in the neighborhood.
Real Azteca has become so popular that earlier this year it expanded into the building next door, opening a large dining room. The restaurant’s Mexican staples such as traditional, stacked plates of non-folded tacos and massive, bulging, sauced-covered burritos appeal to residents.
“It ain’t Taco Bell, but it’s damned good,” said James Small, an African-American on his way out of the restaurant, steaming gordita in hand.
Ortega’s guiding principle is that his food should be simple and real. It’s also cheap—a concern for his customers, as the area is one of the city’s poorest. Many items on the menu are under $3, and customers can get an incredibly filling lunch for $5.
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September 23, 2008
Posted in RW1 Class Stories tagged brooklyn, crime, east flatbush, murder at 3:01 pm by matuas
One man is dead and another is in the hospital after a fight between two groups of young men escalated into a shooting in the lobby of an apartment complex in East Flatbush, Brooklyn Monday night, police said.
Jamel Wisdom, a 19-year-old who lived on nearby Ocean Avenue, was declared dead shortly after police and ambulances arrived, police said.
According to Ellen Borakave, a representative from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, Wisdom died of multiple gunshot wounds to the head, torso, and right arm.
“When I see that one go in the ambulance, he wasn’t doing nothing,” said the superintendent of a nearby building who declined to give his name. “He was just white.”
The injured man, a 19-year-old that police have yet to publicly identify, was taken to nearby Kings College Hospital, where he is recovering from a gunshot wound to the leg, and is in stable condition, police said.
The altercation began last night between two groups of youths, thought to be in their late teens or early twenties, outside of an apartment building at 68 E. 19th St., police said. Police confirmed that both groups knew each other.
Just before 11:00 p.m., Wisdom and at least two other youths ran into the building’s lobby, where Wisdom and one other victim were shot, police said.
The building’s superintendent, Carlos Ayala was eating dinner with his family when he heard several gunshots. He said that there was a group of about eight people outside of his building at that time.
“Some guy is shooting in the lobby, he kills people,” he said. “All the time, it’s in the street. This time, it’s in the building.”
Some eyewitnesses, who refused to give their names out of fear that the gunman would attack them, said they saw a man with a gunshot wound in the knee run around the corner shortly after the gunshots.
Police and ambulances arrived shortly thereafter, responding to a quick 911 call, while residents quickly streamed outside to watch the commotion, police and Ayala said.
A 22-year-old man who declined to give his name knew the injured victim but only identified him by his street nickname, “Geddy.”
The altercation was caught on the lobby’s video cameras, Ayala said, and South Brooklyn detectives were on the scene reviewing the tapes and looking for possible eyewitnesses Tuesday morning.
A handful of uniformed police also stood outside of the building, garnering glares from passing residents. Residents and witnesses were reluctant to give details to reporters.
While few residents spoke to police and reporters, friends of Wisdom quickly made a heartfelt online memorial for him on MySpace. The mournful page contains pictures of Wisdom and identifies his by his street name, “Smooth.”
Police said that there have been several shootings in the area recently, including one on nearby Parade Place.
As of Tuesday night, police said that no arrests had been made and that the investigation is ongoing.
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