Editors hit dog slayer, but not cop who ran down woman

In the more than seven years I've lived in Hackensack, the lack of turn lanes on Passaic Street at Summit Avenue constitutes an annoying bottleneck at almost any time of day, because cars can't pass turning vehicles on narrow, antiquated Passaic.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

If you're wealthy and live in a good town, you can get The Record to use Page 1 for your endless complaints about a cop who shot and killed your vicious dog.

And the editors will even demonize the officer by dredging up his past involvement in the unrelated death of a suspect in Newark more than four years ago (A-1).

But if you're a Vietnamese-American woman living alone in a shabby Hackensack apartment building and get run down by a detective as you're crossing the street, the editors won't even question why no charges were filed against the driver in your death.

That's the stark contrast presented by today's front-page story on Wyckoff Patrolman Kyle Ferreira, who shot and killed a German shepherd that lunged at him and bit his boot when he was investigating a burglary report on April 29 (A-1).

The Record reports that when Ferreira was a Newark police officer in 2010, his patrol car fatally injured a fleeing domestic violence suspect.

Cop kills woman

On March 11, The Record ran a single story on the death of Hue D. Dang, 64, who was fatally injured two days earlier by an unmarked car driven by John C. Straniero, an off-duty detective sergeant from the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office.

The story, reported by telephone, omitted key facts:

Dang was walking in or near a crosswalk when she was struck on Jackson Avenue and Kennedy Street in Hackensack, only a few blocks away from where she lived.

The 5-foot, 100-pound woman, who was carrying a plastic grocery bag, fell and struck her head, leaving heavy blood stains on the pavement.

Hackensack police filed no charges of any kind against Straniero, 49, of Wayne, but the accident is being reviewed by the Union County Prosecutor's Office.

The Record's editors never questioned the decision of Hackensack police nor did they do a follow-up story.

Hue D. Dang's blood, right,  staining the pavement hours after she was fatally injured crossing Jackson Avenue in Hackensack. This photo, from a neighborhood resident, also shows police markings that indicate the unmarked car's right rear tire, left, stopped in the crosswalk, below.

The driver who killed Dang was turning the corner of Jackson Avenue and Kennedy Street toward the ramp for Route 80 west.

Also on Page 1

The A-1 story on the 1915 sinking of the Lusitania is a huge waste of precious space. Why was it written by the paper's transportation reporter?

There is nothing sillier than a reporter who covers a court hearing on Governor Christie's sleight of hand with state pension payments, and tries to predict how the judges are leaning on the issue from their questions to the lawyers on both sides (A-1).

That reminds me of an editor in Hackensack who asked me when a jury would be returning with a verdict in a federal court trial I covered for The Record.

Local news

The Record's story on two people who were fatally injured by a Washington Township police cruiser as they were walking in a travel lane of the New Jersey Turnpike doesn't report the time of the accident early Wednesday (L-1).

But the story does say Sgt. Arsenio Pecora was involved in a training exercise at Fort Dix that ended "shortly before 1 a.m." Wednesday (L-6).

Cliffview Pilot.com reported the pair were struck by Pecora's cruiser at 1:06 a.m., according to state police.

They were pronounce dead at the scene at 4:33 a.m.

Suburban cop kills dog, pushing black deaths off Page 1

Even though temperatures were in the 60s on Sunday, this apparently homeless man was seen on Main Street in Hackensack, wearing two winter parkas. A nearby county shelter, built years ago over city officials' objections, serves three frees meals a day, making the county seat the homeless capitol of Bergen County.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Did you read about Otto Vukobratovic  of Wyckoff on the front page of The Record today, fr0m his birth more than five years ago to his untimely death on Wednesday afternoon?

Ignoring that Otto was only a dog, Editor Martin Gottlieb devotes more space to this animal than the vast majority of humans get in the Woodland Park daily when they die, even if their families pay for a death notice.

Let's cut to the chase. 

According to Wyckoff police, Patrolman Kyle Ferreira was investigating a burglary report, but went to the wrong house, and Otto lunged at him and grabbed onto the cop's boot. 

Four shots put an end to the attack. The dog, hit by two bullets, died later at an animal hospital.

Dog v. teens

Otto not only gets more space than humans, his story is told more prominently than that of many black teens and men who die in police custody, at the hands of police or in such drive-by shootings as the ones in Paterson.

Of course, when you see what else is on Page 1 today, you might understand why Gottlieb made such a fuss over a story that should have been played in the Local section.

Forced busing

Road Warrior John Cichowski is too weary to bother with trying to report extensively on the woes facing thousands of NJ Transit bus riders, including the lack of rush-hour seats.

So, he found an idiotic couple who actually took a red eye flight back from their Seattle vacation to attend a cut-rate preview on Broadway, and claim a Manhattan-bound bus "never came" (A-1).

Who cares? And why is this moronic column that is so untypical of the experience of tens of thousands of bus riders, on Page 1 today?

Older drivers

Two older drivers get The Record's typical shabby treatment, especially compared to the lavish coverage of Otto's death.

An 88-year-old driver whose car "ripped" through a guardrail as he exited the parkway in Washington Township isn't identified. He survived (L-1).

A brief on L-3 finally identifies the Hasbrouck Heights man, 85, who apparently got sick, sending his car into the opposing lane and into a head-on collision in Hackensack on Tuesday, killing him.

But we learn nothing about Victor T. Herbert except his name.

Meat eaters

If the quality of the beef at Eric's Steak House is as mysterious as it is at most other Korean-owned restaurants in Palisades Park, you might want to pass (BL-18).

But Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung was so busy eating she forgot to tell readers whether the restaurant's beef is naturally raised or filled with such harmful additives as antibiotics and growth hormones.

The best she can do is say the $58.99 Cowboy Steak "showed off an assertive beefy goodness."

She complains a prime ribeye came in four "fatty" slices ($45.99)," ignoring that "prime" is a USDA grade given to the fattiest beef.

Bridgegate

A slimmed-down David Wildstein, a former Port Authority official and ally of Governor Christie, pleaded guilty today to the first charges stemming from the federal investigation of the George Washington Bridge lane-closing scandal, The New York Times is reporting.

Two people who were close to Christie also are expected to be indicted today, The Times says.

They are Bill Baroni, former Port Authority deputy executive director, and Bridget Anne Kelly, who as the governor's deputy chief of staff sent an infamous email to Wildstein:

"Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee."

Standing before a federal judge in Newark, Wildstein admitted he conspired with Baroni and Kelly to close bridge access lanes on the first day of school in September 2013 to punish the borough's Democratic mayor for refusing to endorse the GOP bully's reelection.