Newark Citizen Patrol Part of Crime-fighting Tactic

As we’ve cited in previous articles, New Jersey continues to lead the way in utilizing new, innovative approaches to community safety, emergency preparedness and citizen involvement.

New Jersey Alert A Preparedness Role Model

NJ Law Would Require Homeland Security Drills In Schools.

The latest involves convoys of vans led by Newark’s mayor and filled with more than 100 of its employees and residents, flooding the city’s neighborhoods in the middle of the night as a way to reduce crime. It’s a great idea that probably should also be looked at as part of the city’s contingency planning to to utilize during a crisis or emergency.

As part of Community Caravan Night Patrols, more than 120 volunteers have patrolled city streets with Mayor Cory Booker and a crew of off-duty police officers since Sept. 29. Each weekend and a few nights each week, they pile into long caravans of glaring white vans, which weave through the city’s wards, focusing on areas where 85 percent of the city’s shootings have been recorded.

The program’s goal is to disrupt normal crime patterns during typical high-volume hours, gather intelligence for police, and engage residents in the process of crime prevention, said Anthony Campos, the city’s director of public safety.

“You have this whole collage of people coming together for a common cause,” Campos said of the program. “They’re self actualizing by getting out there. They’re no longer spectators.”

Some of the largest caravans will be out this Halloween weekend, which has long been associated with mayhem in Newark. The patrols will start earlier and end later those nights, Booker said.

The initiative is similar to Operation Impact, a law enforcement technique designed by Police Director Garry McCarthy that saturates volatile areas with police to disrupt criminal trends. The essential difference with the caravans is that volunteers are doing the saturating, and the vans and radios are donated by Newark Now, a local non-profit founded by Booker.

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2 Mice Carrying Plague Disappear From NJ Lab, FBI Says No Public Health Risk

The frozen remains of two mice injected with the organism that causes plague have not been accounted for seven weeks after being discovered missing at a University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey facility in Newark, the university said Friday.

The FBI investigated and determined there was no risk to public health or any indication of the terrorist link.

It wasn’t the first time plague-infected mice have disappeared from the New Jersey facility. Four years ago, in September 2005, three live mice infected with bubonic plague bacteria disappeared from various cages. Officials later said they believed the rodents had died.

UMDNJ’s Public Health Research Institute issued a four-paragraph statement about the December incident late Friday saying it believes the red hazardous waste bag containing the dead mice was sterilized and incinerated along with another bag.

“Although the mice in the missing bag were used in vaccine experiments involving the bacteria Yersinia pestis, the organism that causes plague, UMDNJ has no reason to believe that this situation poses a risk to the safety or health of UMDNJ staff or the community at large,” the university said in its prepared statement.

University spokesman Jerry Carey said he did not know why UMDNJ waited seven weeks to disclose the missing mice.

via FOXNews.com – 2 Mice Carrying Plague Disappear From New Jersey Lab, FBI Says No Public Health Risk – Health News | Current Health News | Medical News.