Justifying 'ass time' in the courtroom

Pennsylvania State Police say Gabrielle Reuveni of Paramus was running with her back to traffic when she was struck and killed by a pickup truck in the Poconos.

Hackensack cops at a firing range shot up hard drives from the computers of high-ranking officers in March 2009?

Even if that happened in March 2012, is that really front-page news?

The Record's Mike Kelly and Editor Marty Gottlieb think so, as today's Page 1 critique demonstrates.

I guess the editors are criticizing former Hackensack Police Chief Ken Zisa for not recycling the computer parts.

City in the dark

Meanwhile, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza continue to keep Hackensack residents in the dark about everything from the city's budget and tax rate to what is going to happen to the 20 acres North Jersey Media Group owns along River Street.

Of course, Kelly has to justify all the "ass time" he put in during the disgraced chief's trial, which ended in mid-May, when a jury found Zisa guilty of official corruption and insurance fraud.

Kelly spent I don't know how many days jotting downs bits of testimony and chatting amiably with his colleague, Hackensack reporter Stephanie Akin, who covered the trial.

Woman is mourned

The big A-1 story today is the funeral for Gabrielle Reuveni, 20, of Paramus, the scholar-athlete who was killed by a pickup truck while she was jogging in the Poconos this past Saturday (A-1, L-1 and L-6).

The newsroom staff loves this story, because Reuveni is the kind of high-achieving daughter all of them hope for, but have you ever seen the death of a college-age African-American woman or man treated so lavishly with three straight days of Page 1 coverage?

The editors continue to ignore how Reuveni might have lived, if she observed a basic safety rule -- walking or running toward traffic. 

Her back to traffic

Pennsylvania State Police say she had her back to the truck that killed her, and that the driver crossed a line marking the road's shoulder.

And until Tuesday -- three days after the accident -- no one on the staff apparently asked about the driving record of the man who ran her down, preferring to focus Tuesday's A-1 story on his "rap sheet" for matters totally unrelated to what happened in the Poconos.

Suspect Philip Cise is quoted today as saying the accident was no one's fault, that Reuveni "jumped in the way" of his pickup truck after losing a sneaker (L-6).

But The Record hasn't explained what Cise of Morris County was doing in the Poconos or ruled out whether he has any connection to the Reuveni family, who have a vacation home near where the woman was killed.

A bone to pick

In Better Living, an article from the Chicago Tribune brings readers the really old news that bone-in legs, thighs and whole chickens are cheaper, juicier and more flavorful than skinless and boneless white breast meat (BL-2). 

But there's not a word here about all the harmful antibiotics used to raise most poultry.