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As if having your team lose to the lowly Buffalo Bills isn't enough, one New York Jets fan's day got even worse on Sunday after he rear-ended a car, failed a sobriety test and had an open bottle of whiskey and suspected marijuana in his car, police said. His reason for his brush with the law was simple. "I drank too much because the Jets suck," Christopher Greyshock, 57, of West Milford, told police during his sobriety test, according to a release from the Wayne Police. Officers there were called to the corner of Alps Road and Route 23 at...

Police in West Milford have released five photos taken by 22-year-old Darsh Patel before he was killed by the 300-pound black bear while hiking with four friends in the Apshawa Preserve. The photos show the bear behind a fallen tree in the woods. Investigators say the phone was found with puncture marks from the bear. ... West Milford police and the state Environmental Protection Department said last month that the bear did not seem interested in food and exhibited “stalking type behavior.”

Hikers were undeterred Friday, but people who live in bear country were unnerved by a fatal black bear attack earlier this week near a West Milford hiking trail.Darsh Patel, 22, a Rutgers University student from Edison, was found dead by police in the 576-acre Apshawa Preserve after he and four friends ran from a 4-year-old, 300 pound black bear that was trailing them. Patel’s body was found with bite and claw marks on it. Authorities, who searched two hours for Patel, shot and killed a bear that was found near his body acting aggressively.“They’re normally so docile,” said Suzie...

It seems that those who favor the all or nothing inclusion of December symbols in the annual display in front of the municipal building have been successful in making that happen. Over the weekend - with it still unclear if the lighted tree is to be called a "Christmas tree" or a "Holiday tree" - a crèche and an atheist sign were added to the display. Meanwhile the official name for the lighted tree in the display remains an issue for some. Resident Tim Wagner and others said they will continue to press for administrative action to call the "Holiday...

A West Milford man was charged today with reckless manslaughter in the shooting death of his wife this morning. Police said Frank McDonald shot his wife Cheryl, 44, in the left side of her back with a pellet gun the family used to shoot squirrels. “The way it looks, it was just a freak accident,” police Capt. Andrew Russo said. “If you were going to kill someone, you would find something better to use.” A pellet gun is powered by compressed gas, but at pressures far below those of standard firearms. Frank McDonald called 911 at 9:59 a.m. from the...

When he pushed away from computer screens three years ago and turned to clearing and planting open ground, Pedro Guimaraes wasn’t just buying the organic precepts of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) or finding new avenues for small farms rooted in local economies. He was following a passion and finding a better way to live. "Working in an office, I used to have a lot of migraines, the bad headaches," he says. "Once I started working on a farm, I had very few. It’s not good for my head, being in front of a computer. Being outdoors improves your health." This...

For decades, North Jersey historians, art experts and naturalists had been stumped. Geoff Welch helped determine that an 1846 painting labeled "Janetta Falls, Passaic County" was really Clinton Falls. Where was Janetta Falls, Passaic County? Was there a Janetta Falls in Passaic County? Art experts wanted to know because Jasper F. Cropsey, a celebrated Hudson River School artist, painted several waterfall scenes in 1846 and identified them as Janetta Falls. "It's been a mystery for decades," said Kenneth W. Maddox, art historian at the Newington-Cropsey Foundation, in Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y. Finally, thanks in part to an old magazine article, a local...

WEST MILFORD - A leader of the Million Mom March is coming to town Thursday to speak to parents about the consequences of keeping a gun at home.Joyce Sooy, joyces3@excelonline.com  president of the Bergen/Passaic chapter of the Million Mom March, will speak on the topic, "Can We Prevent Gun Violence?" at 7:30 p.m. Our Lady Queen of Peace R.C. Church on Union Valley Road.Sooy led a bus caravan from Bergen County on Mother's Day in 2000 to attend the Million Mom March in Washington, D.C. Thousands of mothers around the nation gathered to call on lawmakers to enact stricter gun...

Jeff White in the vegetable garden on his 7-acre West Milford property. The state claims part of the garden is too close to wetlands. WEST MILFORD -- He hired experts, tested the soil, planted veggies and erected an electrified fence to keep out the bears. But what newbie farmer Jeff White didn't know was that he also had to shield his garden from red tape.  State officials say part of the 4,500-square-foot garden sits too close to wetlands. Specifically, it is on a "deed-restricted transition area" or buffer of wetlands, and the state wants it dismantled. The state also...

With strong faith, seminarian stood up to Castro and was expelled from Cuba Cuban-born Enrique Corona, a diocesan seminarian, most likely has never heard of Richard Stockton, one of the America's Founding Fathers. Although separated by 230 years of history, both men have this in common - each of them put his own freedom on the line, enduring a prison sentence for having gathered up the courage to put pen to paper in voice of freedom.   At the dawn of the American Revolution, Stockton, a New Jerseyan, made the brave decision to sign the Declaration of Independence - an act...

Cat proves size doesn't always matter in his neck of the woods. To his neighbors, he's a loner, a sometimes-friendly, sometimes- surly senior who spends his days wandering through the woods. He is particular about his yard. Strang ers are not always welcomed. But last week, Jack the cat be came a hero when he chased a black bear out of his neighbors' yard and up a tree. Twice. Last Sunday afternoon Suzanne Giovanetti was reading at the kitchen table when her husband Dean cried out from the TV room at the back of the house: A black bear had...

WEST MILFORD — More than 100 demonstrators, including a few wearing bear costumes and carrying stuffed bears, protested Saturday on Route 23 at the corner of Canistear Road to oppose the upcoming bear hunt. Chanting "Kill the Hunt. Not the bears," and holding signs saying "Bullets are not science," the protesters stood on both sides of the highway encouraging motorists to honk their car horns in support. The six-day hunt will start Dec. 5 and was approved last week by state Environmental Commissioner Bradley Campbell as a method to control the state's bear population. The last bear hunt was two...

Tragedy in Passaic County. A small plane carrying two people crashed in West Milford yesterday, killing both passengers. The Federal Aviation Administration says the Cessna 182 was attempting to take off from Greenwood Lake Airport when it crashed at the end of the runway. The four-seat, single-engine plane was quickly engulfed by flames and was destroyed. Authorities say the victims were 79-year-old Harold Botsford Junior, a flight instructor from Ringwood, and Ted Fletcher, a pilot from Franklin Lakes who was trying to refresh his license.

A minor earthquake occurred at 18:24:17 (UTC) - Coordinated Universal Time on Tuesday, August 26, 2003. The magnitude 3.8 event occurred 1 km (1 miles) S of Milford, NJ. The hypocentral depth was 5 km ( 3 miles). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Magnitude 3.8 Time Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 18:24:17 (UTC) - Coordinated Universal Time Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 3:24:17 PM (ADT) - Atlantic Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 2:24:17 PM (EDT) - Eastern Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 1:24:17 PM (CDT) - Central Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 12:24:17 PM (MDT) - Mountain Tuesday, August 26, 2003 at 11:24:17 AM...

DEP official: Bruin wasn't trying to eat Vernon hiker By Rob Jennings, Daily Record A 400-pound black bear that pounced on a Vernon hiker was not trying to eat her, New Jersey's top environmental official said Tuesday in refuting a description by his spokesman about Sunday's apparent attack in Wawayanda State Park. Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bradley M. Campbell added that he "had no reason to doubt the victim's account" of being chased and pulled down by the bruin on the Wingdam Trail. The trail remained closed Tuesday evening, with the bear on the loose and unlikely to be...

<p>WEST MILFORD, N.J. (AP) A homeowner who shot a large bear that was drawn to his house by the smell of sizzling pork chops was charged Thursday with unlawfully injuring an animal.</p> <p>The state Department of Environmental Protection's Division of Fish and Wildlife cited Patrick Flynn Jr. for shooting a 400-pound black bear that entered his yard last week.</p>

Boy's bear visit speaks volumes about hunt Thursday, May 22, 2003 By RICHARD COWENSTAFF WRITER It's been a wild two days for a kid still in diapers who can't talk, but Mark Tregidgo of Sparta has suddenly become the poster child for New Jersey's proposed bear hunt. Tregidgo survived a close encounter with a black bear that wandered into an enclosed front porch Tuesday afternoon and touched him. Now the bear is dead, the child was to appear with his family today on "Good Morning America," - and the state Division of Youth and Family Services is investigating whether the...

West Milford Man Bitten On Wrist By Bear POSTED: 3:47 p.m. EDT May 23, 2003 WEST MILFORD, N.J. -- Another bear attack has occurred in the Garden State. Police in West Milford say a homeowner was bitten on the wrist after his dog attacked a bear that strayed into the yard with two cubs Friday. Police Chief James Dykstra said the injury wasn't life-threatening. The homeowner was taken to a hospital. His name wasn't released. Dykstra said the bear may have been foraging when the dog went after it. The homeowner intervened and was bitten on the right wrist and...