Free Republic

CAMDEN, N.J., Dec. 23 - If anybody was surprised that Camden was recently ranked America's most dangerous city, it wasn't the people who live here. In the past 12 months, there have been 53 homicides, including a 12-year-old shot to death on his porch for his radio, more than 800 aggravated assaults, including a toddler shot in the back of the head, at least 750 robberies and 150 acts of arson, more than 10,000 arrests and one glaring nonarrest - a serial rapist on the loose downtown. All in a city of 79,000, nine square miles small. For decades, Camden...

Camden, N.J. overtakes Detroit as most-dangerous city in U.S. 11/21/2004, 11:58 p.m. ET The Associated Press TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Camden, N.J. has become the nation's most-dangerous city, according to a Kansas company's yearly ranking based on crime statistics. Camden, which was ranked third last year, took the dubious honor from Detroit, which fell to second in this year's ranking, followed by Atlanta, St. Louis and Gary, Ind. Camden area officials downplayed the designation, saying many steps have already been taken to reduce crime in the city. "Irrespective of labels and characterizations by outside groups, the Camden anti-crime partnership, along...

CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) - A postal worker was sentenced Wednesday to a year of probation for causing the deaths of his two young sons by leaving them in the back of his sport-utility vehicle in midday heat. Derrick Strothers, 39, could have received up to six years in prison on each of two charges of involuntary manslaughter. Federal prosecutors had sought five years of probation. Authorities said Strothers dropped off his wife at her job on Aug. 15, 2003, then headed to the East Orange post office where he worked. His sons - Derrick Jr., 2, and Dylan, 1 -...

CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) — The incoming leader of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Camden has decided that Gov. James E. McGreevey cannot receive communion. The Most Rev. Joseph Galante said Thursday that he was taking the stance primarily because the divorced governor, who is Catholic, remarried without receiving a church annulment. He also cited McGreevey's support of abortion rights, stem-cell research and other positions which contradict church views. Galante, who was to be installed Friday during a Mass at St. Agnes Church in Blackwood, said he felt duty bound to take a hard line stance on the issue. He said...

CAMDEN - After a trip by ambulance to the emergency room Wednesday night, a Somerdale mother left the hospital carrying a prescription to treat her son's high fever and earache. She never filled it, authorities said. Instead, Sandra A. Roman, 29, took her 4-year-old son to Camden and bought crack cocaine, authorities said today. After getting high, she left her son with a stranger at a Camden bus-rail station, officials said. The preschooler was discovered by a passerby, still in his stroller inside the station, about 6:15 a.m. yesterday, roughly six hours after his mother had left him, officials said....

On September 11th, 2002, suspected Sniper John Allen Muhammad walked into the Camden, New Jersey State Motor Vehicles office, to register the now-notorious "blue Caprice" he'd just purchased. Though the car had not yet converted been into a rolling sniper's nest, what happened in the next several minutes leaves little doubt that Muhammad had something sinister in mind. The registration transaction began at 8:52 am. At 8:58 am., while Muhammad was still standing at the counter, someone (now believed to be fellow suspect, Lee Malvo) phoned a bomb threat at the Motor Vehicles office on the 1st Anniversary of what...

After holding out for more than a month, Mayor Gwendolyn Faison has decided to give up her "stolen car" - a black 1998 Lincoln Town Car. The car, which had been used since January as her official chauffeur-driven transportation to municipal appointments, had become a vehicle of ridicule for opponents of the 77-year-old mayor. The car had been reported stolen from its owner - a 70-year-old Pennsauken man - earlier this year and was abandoned in Camden. "We were notified by [the Camden County] Prosecutor's Office that proper procedures were not used to obtain the title to car," Christine Jones-Tucker,...

Childhood is its own country, and for some it's a brutal place to live. At 18, Matthew Lovett of Oaklyn, N.J., is described in news accounts as a peculiar loner, a tall, stooped kid who stood out because he didn't dress or act like his peers and hung out solely with younger kids. Obsessed with certain movies and computer games, Matthew reportedly tried to protect his younger brother, James - born with a disfiguring cleft palate and retaining a speech impediment after multiple corrective surgeries - from the teasing and humiliation his physical condition invited. He's described by former high...

A 18,16 and 14 year old surburban males arrested with a "cache " of guns 2,000 rounds of ammo multiple knives. Planned to car=jack a car and drive around on a killing spree. Showed the Cache on Fox---looked like a old bolt action rifle, 2 pump shot-guns and revolver and a 9mm semi-automatic. All looked old. No evil assault rifles. Alot of long knives and ammo!

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia complained Sunday that courts have gone overboard in keeping God out of government. Scalia, speaking at a religious ceremony, said the constitutional wall between church and state has been misinterpreted both by the Supreme Court and lower courts. As an example, he pointed to a ruling in California that barred students from saying the Pledge of Allegiance with the phrase "one nation under God." That appeals court decision is on hold pending further consideration by the same court, but the Supreme Court could eventually be asked to review the case. Scalia, the main speaker at...

Camden, New Jersey-AP -- The F-B-I in New Jersey is asking for the public's help in locating a man being sought for questioning in connection with the sniper shootings. Nathanel Osbourne is listed as the co-owner of the 1990 Chevrolet Caprice found at a Maryland rest stop yesterday. The other owner is John Allen Muhammad, one of the two sniper suspects who were found in the car and arrested. The car is registered to the address of a Camden, New Jersey restaurant. The owner of the restaurant says Osbourne did odd jobs for him there -- and sometimes stayed in...

The younger of two men arrested Thursday morning in connection with the Washington, D.C.-area sniper shootings is believed to have attended public school last year in south Fort Myers. John Lee Malvo, 17, was arrested at a rest stop in Frederick County, Md., and is one of two suspects in recent sniper attacks that have left 10 individuals dead and three wounded. Lee County school officials confirm that a teenager named Lee Boyd Malvo attended Cypress Lake High from Aug. 13 to Oct. 16, 2001, and authorities presume that individual is the same person arrested Thursday. Police also arrested John...

At the Virtua Health emergency room in Camden, a 22-year-old carried in from a concert at the Tweeter Center screams and curses at a nurse trying, gently, to help him sober up. Just a few hours later, in a separate incident, Camden police arrest another 22-year-old concertgoer for allegedly kicking and punching an unconscious man. By the time the night is over, drunk and high people will overwhelm the emergency rooms at Virtua-West Jersey Hospital, Cooper Hospital-University Medical Center, and Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center. Police will arrest or issue citations to 32 people on charges ranging from aggravated...

(CBS) The black blobs that have mysteriously shown up on the streets and sidewalks of Camden, New Jersey were at least partially explained Friday. State and county officials said the stuff is paraffin wax and poses no risk, but they won't venture a guess as to how it got to the Waterfront South neighborhood. Paraffin wax is used in industrial processes and for making candles. Camden County Health Department spokeswoman Lorraine Hynes said hot weather probably made the goo more noticeable, melting dabs of it into dark, waxy, half-dollar-sized splotches in an area with industrial facilities and homes. Solving the...