Criticized in Paterson, Speziale now called pain at airports

Aboard NJ Transit's No. 165 bus -- a cheap, efficient way to travel to and from Manhattan, as long as you don't do so during the rush hour, when seats are scarce and delays are frequent.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record of Woodland Park today carries the third major story about Paterson Police Director Jerry Speziale, who claims he and his fiance were "held hostage" by Port Authority police as he was trying to leave for a vacation in Puerto Rico.

Poor guy. Why are fellow law-enforcement officers treating Speziale so shabbily?

Today, the Port Authority responded to Speziale's claim the agency is retaliating against him.

Speziale says he was a whistle-blower who reported "corruption and wasteful spending" when he was deputy police superintendent at the bi-state agency (A-1).

Speziale filed a federal lawsuit last year, alleging the agency targets him at its airports.

In response, the Port Authority accuses Speziale of repeatedly causing trouble at airline terminals, especially when he isn't treated like a VIP and is forced to wait in the same security lines most travelers have to endure (A-6).

Coated with Teflon

You could call Speziale the "Teflon Cop."

I cannot recall The Record every closely examining the job he did as Passaic County sheriff or what has happened under his watch as police director in Paterson, where he seems unable or unwilling to stop the gun violence that has claimed so many innocent lives.

So far, the local editors have assigned three major stories on his problems at John F. Kennedy International Airport last Friday.

Compare that to the zero stories assigned to assess his performance as police director in Silk City, and a complete absence of editorial comment on whether he should be doing more to stop the senseless violence.

Another viewpoint

Today, on a site called Bluelight.org, I came across this commentary on a North Jersey.com story, reporting Speziale had resigned as sheriff in 2010 to take the Port Authority job:

"I aint gonna get all into it now but I have always personally hated this guy [Speziale] so much and im really glad to see him gone. he was a power hungry tyrant who was obsessed with buying more and more technology for the police department for the purpose of drug enforcement....puttin more money into the SWAT teams, the drug raids, all that shit, instead of crackin down on violent crime and some of the other shit that is a huge problem in paterson. Shit, last summer the homicides were POPPIN off like every weekend sometimes more than one in a weekend and none of that shit changed but he just kept goin hard on the drugs, puttin all their money into this crazy enforcement shit , like fuckin military grade equipment for their drug raid teams."

Click on this link for the full commentary:

Failed drug war in Paterson

Police news

If it wasn't for police news and drive-by photos of non-fatal accidents, The Record's Local section would literally be filled with blank spaces (see L-3 today).

Unable to inspire their local staff to gather enough municipal news, veteran Assignment Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza scramble every day to plug those holes.

That may be the motive for treating Speziale and other law-enforcement officials so gently -- why criticize the golden geese that lay all those Law & Order eggs?

'Lost' money

Today, a follow-up quotes Mahwah police as saying the ATM workers who left a bag filled with $150,000 in cash on a curb are not suspects (L-3).

A white van stopped, and a man wearing shorts and a T-shirt is "seen getting out ... to pick up the bag without looking inside," police say.

Without looking inside?

More questions are unanswered.

Will the ATM workers be keeping their jobs, and will the unnamed company that employs them be able to recover any of the lost money from an insurance policy?