17 reasons prosecutor is clamming up

The family of Rickey McFadden, a suspect who was shot dead by police, is planning to sue, alleging racial indifference, police brutality and multiple civil rights violations.

As he did with the fatal police shooting of Malik Williams of Garfield in December 2011, Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli is releasing few details on the death of Rickey Mcfadden, a mentally ill Leonia man who allegedly robbed a CVS where he had been a frequent customer.

Today, The Record leads Page 1 with the family's claim police officers fired at McFadden, who was black,  a total of 17 times on Nov. 25.

The police officers haven't been identified, and one reason may be because the editors are too lazy or too intimidated to request a meeting with Molinelli and the police chiefs of Leonia and Palisades Park.

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes or her deputy, Dan Sforza, have trained their reporters to communicate with police on stories such as this via e-mail or telephone, and to print the most ridiculous statements from the overpaid chiefs. 

"Releasing the name now would only subject the officers to unnecessary attention during what is a very difficult and stressful time for them," Leonia Police Chief Jay Ziegler said in an e-mail on Wednesday, according to The Record.

If it's stressful for the officers, imagine what McFadden's family is going through.

Today's story is based completely on allegations in a notice of the family's intent to sue filed by attorney Rosemary Arnold, who says she based her claims on statements from three witnesses.

Of course, it's clear The Record made no attempt to find any of those witnesses, but was content to wait for official press releases.

Belated toll news

The Johnny-come-lately who writes the Road Warrior column is finally telling readers who own hybrid cars, including the Chevy Volt, they can get a Green E-ZPass -- which has been available for years --  that gives them big discounts at the Hudson River crossings (L-1).

But Staff Writer John Cichowski remains mum on the car-pool discount, which is available to all drivers at any time of the day or night as long as they register their E-ZPass and use a Cash/E-Z Pass lane so the toll attendant can check to see if there are 3 people in the vehicle.

As with so many columns in the past, today's piece is based solely on e-mails from readers.

Despite all the questions Cichowski gets about the pricing of gasoline and cash/credit card policies, the reporter has yet to tell his readers about credit cards that give drivers 1 to 4 cents back on every dollar they spend on gasoline.  

I use an American Express card that gives me 14 cents back on a $3.50 gallon of regular. 

Clarification

In a post on Tuesday, I cited comments from Anonymous readers, including this one:

"I guess math isn't the reporters/editors strong suit and the reason they decided to become journalists instead of mathematicians."

Then, I got this:

"I made the comment about math not being a journalist's strong suit which was meant to be facetious. Any newspaper of record should employ one knowledgeable in different disciplines to get the facts correct in the editing process, or at least in the Internet age to look it up."  

Amen.