Grand jury indicts Hackensack's police chief

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A grand jury returned an indictment against suspended Police Chief Ken Zisa.

This is what we'll probably see on the front of The Record of Woodland Park on Wednesday:

Hackensack police chief indicted

Compare the Cliffview Pilot.com version, above, to what appeared on northjersey.com just before 10 p.m. Tuesday. Who is responsible for these two messy paragraphs?

northjersey.com story

'Your honor, Mr. Green isn't here'

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The Rutgers College football team in 1882.

I feel sorry for that Rutgers football player who is paralyzed, but does Editor Francis Scandale really expect me to read this much about  it? I follow Formula 1 racing, not baseball, so I'm totally uninterested in the main element on Page 1 today. The Democrat turned Republican who is intent on unseating the congressman from Wantage? Yawn.

But look at the fourth A-1 story today in The Record of Woodland Park -- a glowing profile of the defense attorney for Ridgefield Mayor Anthony R. Suarez, who is on trial in federal court. Look at that client list. Read about his rags-to-riches rise. Why should I be interested in that? What kind of hourly rate does he command? $300? $400? More?


Oh, that's not in the story. Is that a deliberate oversight? 

In deference to the bar, The Record long has avoided discussing legal fees or even what attorneys keep when a jury award or settlement yields many millions of dollars for a plaintiff. And, of course, the former Hackensack daily has never explored the larger issue of how high legal fees and the snail's pace of civil litigation limit people's access to the courts.

Poor Suarez. Even if he is found not guilty, he'll probably be broke or his "legal defense fund" will be empty.


The relationships among judges and attorneys is so cozy. A criminal defense attorney can walk into a courtroom and say, "Your honor, Mr. Green isn't here. I'd like a postponement." And the judge, who was an attorney, immediately understands the lawyer hasn't been paid his retainer. No retainer, no representation, no hearing.


The front of Local has an "Accident of the Day" photo on the front -- a signature of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes. No Hackensack or Teaneck news appears in the section.


Food Editor Susan Sherrill and Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung have been so busy stuffing their faces with cupcakes, apple pie and other desserts, they didn't have time to write anything local for Better Living today.


Sherrill has been slaving away on her debut "Your Kitchen" column, based on a cookbook recipe. I've been eating takeout for days in anticipation.

Sugar overload?

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Maybe all the sugar consumed by Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung and Food Editor Susan Sherill is affecting food coverage in Better Living, the omnibus features section in The Record of Woodland Park. These two consume an incredible number of cupcakes, cake, cheesecake and other desserts that don't start with the letter "c." 



Here is Ung's latest Twitter tweet:

Trying out @ToddWilbur 's Top Secret Cheesecake Factory red velvet cheesecake recipe. My 3rd red velvet in 2 wks.Kitchen taking on red glow about 4 hours ago via web 

On the Second Helpings blog (northjersey.com), Sherill discusses the recent cupcake mix battle:

To cleanse our palates between bites, we sipped two new fortified milk varieties from Farmland Dairy - Skim Plus with Fiber and Skim Plus with Omega 3. A surprise “gift” from the dairy, these had been delivered to me in an insulated container and I was initially skeptical; I prefer my milk organic, whole and undoctored. However, despite the chicory used in the fiber milk and the fish oil in the Omega 3 milk, the taste of each one was indistinguishable from “regular” milk and it made us feel like we weren’t completely on sugar overload as we tasted the cupcakes!

Posted by Susan Sherrill on 10/18 at 11:46 AM

Everyone drops the ball

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The Ramapo River is endangered by toxic dirt piles in Wayne, officials say.

The dominant story on Page 1 of The Record of Woodland Park today is a sad tale of business owners who have for more than a decade resisted efforts to clean up piles of toxic dirt near a river. But despite the involvement of half a dozen staff members, this takeout puts the focus on dirt, not people.

Let's start with the stupid headline:

Court orders fail

to move mounds

"Mounds" are inanimate objects, and I'm sure the judge didn't order them to do anything. Why isn't the focus on the owners of the business, and why are their names buried on the continuation page, as if all of this is some sort of bureaucratic snafu?

It's bad enough the reporter can't get the father and son involved in the business, Allan Rombough Sr. of Medham and Andrew Rombough, to comment. But was an effort made to contact their attorney for comment? And why doesn't the reporter address an obvious question: Why didn't the state or the town hire a contractor to remove the dirt years ago, during flusher times, and bill the business?

The Local news section is another laughable effort from head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her minions. It's a typical Monday section: A charity walk and an awareness-raising walk are written about at great length and played out front, because that's all the desperate editors have.

An overturned car is the gee-whiz, "Accident of the Day" photo element on L-1, and more non-profit news fills all of L-3.


Columnist Mike Kelly is really angry at the imam behind the Lower Manhattan mosque proposal, and continues his smear campaign against him on L-1 today. 

Kelly's language is uncharacteristically harsh for a reporter who treats just about everybody else with kid gloves, including his pal, convicted felon and former New York City Police Commissioner Bernie "The Crook" Kerik. Is this an anti-Muslim tirade?


Editor Francis Scandale got rid of the paper's only black, Hispanic and female news columnist, but kept Kelly the Mouse. Amazing.


Don't look for any Hackensack, Teaneck, Englewood news today.