Paterson police czar has more young blood on his hands

An art gallery on Palisade Avenue in Englewood.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

At least Paterson Police Director Jerry Speziale has learned to talk the talk when another innocent young life is taken on the city's violent streets.

"We are not going to give up," Speziale told The Record, "we are going to do what we have to do to make a safe city."

You'll have to search for the interview, buried as it is on the continuation page of the A-1 story on the shooting death of Armoni Sexton, 15 (A-7).

The editors have been treating the police director gently -- Heaven forbid he is put on the spot -- even though the 6-foot-7 aspiring basketball star is the third young person killed by random gunshots in less than a year (A-1).

What exactly is Speziale waiting for before he asks for help from the state police or the Passaic County Sheriff's Office, which he once headed?

It's pretty obvious Paterson police are unable to control gun violence on city streets. How many more kids have to die?

Forget about appealing directly to Governor Christie, even if he can be found.

He's already screwed Paterson royally with state aid cuts that forced the layoff of 125 officers in 2011. Now, even with new hires, the force is 20% smaller than before the cut.

Rough editing

They've been at it for decades, but Assignment Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sfroza still can't handle breaking news.

The reporting and editing of the stories on Sexton's death are poor.

The main front-page headlines stink:

Death Avenue claims another

Paterson teen

is third fatally shot

in past 10 months

Why not use the word "gunman" or "gunmen" to indicate that it is uncontrolled gun ownership that claimed the boy's life, not a street called "Death Avenue"?

The photo caption on Page 1 shows Gloria Sexton, who is identified as "a family member of Armoni Sexton," apparently because the photographer didn't ask her relationship to the dead teen. 

Why didn't the editor who wrote that just say she is the teen's "relative"?

This same caption mentions "the street near Godwin Avenue and Rosa Parks Boulevard, where the 15-year-old was shot Saturday."

But the first paragraph of the lead news story reports Sexton was with a group of teenagers "on Rosa Parks Boulevard" when he was shot, not "near" the intersection of Godwin and Rosa Parks (A-1).

Finally, also in the lead paragraph, Sexton is called inappropriately one of the "children" who "have lost their lives in the violence that strangles every day life in city neighborhoods."

Later, Sexton and the two girls who were killed by gunshots in the past year, Nazerah Bugg, 14; and Genesis Rincon, 12, are referred to as "young people" (A-7).

Wasted space

Why is Editor Martin Gottlieb wasting precious Page 1 space on Matt Mowers and Matthew Moroney, two Christie aides in New Hampshire no one has ever heard of?

Staff Writer Melissa Hayes reports the margin of Christie's second-term victory was "impressive," but doesn't note voter turnout was the lowest for any New Jersey gubernatorial election in history (A-1).

Fewer than four out of 10 voters went to the polls for the November 2013 contest, signalling incredible apathy.

A real turkey

Today's Local section literally is a turkey.

The biggest local news is a wild turkey that is being fed in an A&P parking lot in Closter (L-1).

A caption for the photo on L-1 -- showing the 29th annual Lincoln Tunnel Challenge 5K -- doesn't note the race left hundreds of New Jersey motorists frozen in traffic jams at the tunnel's Manhattan entrances late Sunday afternoon.