Free Republic

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Parishioners of Brighton Heights Reformed Church in St. George helped find and furnish a new apartment in New Brighton for a family with a disabled girl that was living in squalid conditions. Alice Frett, a single mother of daughter Moasia, 9, who has cerebral palsy, and sons Tyrik, 18, Molike, 14, and Cyril Sheppard, 2, were renting an apartment in Tompkinsville that was badly in need of basic repairs and infested with vermin. A walk through the old unit by the pastor and an Advance reporter and photographer showed broken windows, holes in walls and floors,...

A Muslim chaplain for the city’s Department of Correction showed up for work on Wednesday as he routinely does — entering the city jail in Lower Manhattan to minister to some of the roughly 900 male inmates there. But when the chaplain, Imam Zulqarnain Abu-Shahid, flung his shoulder bag onto an X-ray machine at the entrance of the Manhattan Detention Complex, at 125 White Street, officers were alerted to the presence of metal. They found a pair of scissors and three metal blades, the kind used in box cutters, in the bag’s outer flap, the authorities said. Imam Abu-Shahid was...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Organizers of a proposed charter school named after the president have rescinded the honor after the Obama Administration informed them of a long-standing White House policy disallowing the use of the president's name while he is in office. The group designing the Barack Obama Community Charter School also learned a state law prohibits naming institutions for a living person without his or her permission. The new name for the proposed K-8 is the Staten Island Community Charter School. One of the organizers, Lorna Harris of Silver Lake, said committee members are disappointed about having to change...

Hey Staten Island! Wake up! Staten Island is one of NYC's five boroughs -- home to cops, firefighters and a mix of hard working blue collar and white collar families. Staten Island was hit real bad on 911. They have no clue how dirty the Working Families Party is. But we do. The Democrats are a racketeering organization using their proxies like the Left wing Working Families Party (how ironic), ACORN, and community organizing organizations to steal elections and usurp the will of free men. (more here) The NY Post came out with this story on the Working Families Party...

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- It could be a van with a plumber logo on it or a yellow livery cab. Or maybe it's a generic gray sedan, driven by a man who looks like an accountant. The only way you will really know what the top-secret surveillance vehicle that recently hit the streets of the Mid-Island's 122nd Precinct looks like is if you get busted in some criminal act. Similar to the one launched by the Island's MTA police two years ago, the $55,000 high-tech ride was funded by City Councilman James Oddo (R-Mid-Island/Brooklyn) to help combat quality-of-life crimes. The...

S.I. baseball-bat wielding neighbor rescues girl from abductor in woods A baseball bat-wielding Staten Island homeowner was hailed as a hero after he chased away a man who dragged a 15-year-old girl into the woods, police and witnesses said. Patrick Klatt, 51, was inside his Great Kills home Thursday night when he heard the young girl's screams from a wooded area across the street. "He kept telling her to be quiet," Klatt said about the sicko. "[But] she yelled just loud enough for me to hear." Klatt grabbed a baseball bat and ran out his door. As he crossed the...

The speaker is Kevin McCullough: columnist, author and radio-show host. The occasion is the August 2nd Staten Island (NY) Tea Party held at historic Conference House Park. Despite dangerous weather, almost 700 patriots came out to make their voices heard. Kevin makes a reference to Jesus Christ, and then...Watch what happens...!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DR. BETSY McCAUGHEY TO SPEAK AT SECOND STATEN ISLAND TEA PARTY Former Lt. Governor Targets Obama Health Care Plan Staten Island, NY, July 9, 2009 – Dr. Betsy McCaughey, the former Lt. Governor of New York State, health care policy expert and staunch patient rights advocate, has agreed to speak at the Staten Island Tea Party at the Park, on Sunday, August 2, 2009. Dr. McCaughey has been an outspoken critic of government run health care as far back as the Clinton Administration, and was credited at that time with exposing so many flaws in “Hillary-care” that...

For the past two days, visitors to a park in Staten Island's Fort Wadsworth section have stumbled upon a gory mystery -- a mutilated animal, possibly a dog or a goat, wrapped in a white sheet. Parkgoers found two such animals in Von Briesen Park yesterday and this morning, city Parks Department officials confirmed. The discovery has sparked speculation of ritual sacrifice and cult activity, and has led one Port Richmond woman to douse part of the ground where one animal was found with holy water, in an attempt to ward off what she believes is an evil presence. Several...

NEW YORK – Now that's Italian! A Staten Island restaurant is relying on a group of Italian-born grandmothers for its menus. The women take turns cooking at 35-seat Enoteca Maria, using recipes from the different parts of Italy they come from.

Secession fever is burning hotter among Republicans in the state Senate these days, leading GOP Sen. Andrew Lanza to hope that his plan for breaking Staten Island away from New York City will get a jump start.

Note: The following text is a quote: Staten Island Man Sentenced To 69 Months In Prison For Providing Material Support And Resources To Hizballah LEV L. DASSIN, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that JAVED IQBAL, a/k/a "John Iqbal," 45, of Staten Island, New York was sentenced today to 69 months in prison for providing material support to Hizballah, a Foreign Terrorist Organization. The sentence was imposed by United States District Judge RICHARD M. BERMAN in Manhattan federal court. According to the criminal Complaint, Count Two of the Superseding Indictment, to which IQBAL...

Aiken, Richmond and Columbia counties. Local law enforcement agencies also report hearing the boom, but no one knows what caused it. Chris Turner, and Aiken County resident, told WJBF News Channel 6’s Sheena Bodie what he saw and heard, in a phone interview. We have also been informed that two Aiken County Sheriff’s Office deputies reportedly saw a fireball in the sky. An Aiken County resident describes to WJBF that he saw a fireball in the sky, after a loud boom was heard all over the CSRA around 3:00 a.m., Friday morning. Dr. Gary Senn, the director of the DuPont...

Welcome to the blogspot of the Staten Island Tax Day Tea Party. We are not affiliated with any organization; we are simply a group of AMERICAN CITIZENS who refuse to sit idly by and watch the destruction of all the values we hold so dear. Our Congressman, Michael McMahon, has been marching in virtual lock-step with the Obama Administration on all their left-wing legislation, mouthing platitudes to Staten Islanders while essentially helping the Democrats in Congress tear down the foundations of free-market capitalism. We ask you to join us at NOON on TAX DAY - Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 -...

<p>A judge in New York has ruled against a Liberian woman who cited religious reasons for smuggling meat from an endangered species of monkey into the United States.</p> <p>Raymond J Dearie, a federal US district judge, said that Mamie Manneh was wrong when she claimed that her faith - a sect of Christianity - meant that she did not need to apply for permits to import exotic food stuffs.</p>

December 23, 2008 Note: The following text is a quote: http://newyork.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/pressrel08/nyfo122308a.htm STATEN ISLAND SATELLITE TV OPERATOR PLEADS GUILTY TO PROVIDING MATERIAL SUPPORT TO HIZBALLAH TV STATION LEV L. DASSIN, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that JAVED IQBAL, a/k/a "John Iqbal," 45, of Staten Island, New York, pleaded guilty today in Manhattan federal court to providing material support to Hizballah, a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization. According to the criminal Complaint, the count (Count Two) of the Superseding Indictment to which IQBAL pleaded guilty, and statements during the guilty plea proceeding before United States...

  Buyer beware! Or in this case, booster beware. Staten Island Mall is posting faces of shoplifters on video terminals.   Slapping the faces of convicted shoplifters on video terminals in the Staten Island Mall is a big hit - or not, depending on who you ask."I think it's fabulous," said Dan Ozimek, a 62-year-old mall shopper. "If you want to do something wrong, you should be prepared to have your face on a screen." "I think it's unfair because people should be forgiven," countered Jason Harr, 24. "People make mistakes and shouldn't have their faces publicized for stealing, say,...

BAY RIDGE – Adding to the hotly contested battles to replace outgoing Congressman Vito Fossella is a political “crazy-quilt” pattern to Democrat Mike McMahon’s campaign after his endorsement by Staten Island’s top Conservative, while not so favorite GOP son Robert Straniere is upset over apparent dissentient inter-party “dirty tricks.” In one of Campaign ‘08’s bizarre political twists, Staten Island Borough President James Molinaro, Richmond County’s Conservative Party executive vice chair, endorsed McMahon. This was accepted by the moderate Staten Island councilman as a logical move, given his working relationship with Molinaro since 2002. Molinaro, who was elected twice as borough...

The two candidates were once friends, with one crediting the other for bringing him into Republican Party leadership. But the competition for the Republican nomination for a Congressional seat on Staten Island has produced a level of rancor that has left the two candidates bitterly sparring and the party in disarray. In the last week, Dr. Jamshad I. Wyne, the finance chairman of the Republican Party on Staten Island and a candidate for Congress, accused his rival in the primary, former Assemblyman Robert A. Straniere, of trying to persuade him to make illegal contributions to Mr. Straniere’s failed 2001 campaign...

NEW YORK — A man was sentenced to five years in prison on Friday for conspiring to blow up a busy Manhattan subway station. James Elshafay, had pleaded guilty and testified against the mastermind of the plot, Shahawar Matin Siraj, at a trial last year in federal court in Brooklyn. Elshafay, the son of an Egyptian father and Irish mother, testified that after meeting Siraj at an Islamic bookstore, they hatched an initial scheme — later abandoned — to blow up the four bridges connecting Staten Island to Brooklyn and New Jersey. He also told jurors at Siraj's trial that...