[Photo by RACHAEL SHIRLEY] BY JEFF DEENEY “Today I saw…” is a series of nonfiction shorts based on my experiences as a caseworker serving formerly homeless families now living in North and West Philadelphia. I decided not long after starting the job that I was seeing so many fascinating and disturbing things in the city’s poorest neighborhoods that I needed to start cataloging them. I hope this bi-weekly column serves as a record of a side of the city that many Philadelphians don’t come in contact with on a daily basis. I want to capture moments not frequently covered […]
POP IN TAPE: Hot Wax In The 215
VINYL SOLUTION: Jerry Weber of Jerry’s Records, Pittsburgh, PA — the man who taught a generation of yinzers to love records BY MICHAEL FICHMAN Every summer, I troll around the streets of Philadelphia on sunny Saturdays and Sundays, looking for records. Behind mattresses and shitty table lamps, there are stacks of moldy gems waiting to see the light of a crisp diamond stylus. There are Al Greens who have gone decades without singing sweet romance, Bohannons who haven’t put their lifts on since the Carter Administration, Dwight Yoakam’s dry and desiccated like roadkill ten miles outside of Bakersfied. A typical […]
INFANTICIDE: Dead Trunk Baby Ruled Homicide
The Delaware County medical examiner has made public his findings in the death of a newborn boy – found last January in the trunk of a car. Medical examiner Fredric Hellman would not comment but released a written statement citing asphyxiation – smothering – as the cause of death for the newborn baby boy. His death has been ruled a homicide and charges are pending. The baby was found January 22nd in a duffel bag in the trunk of a car on Drexel Avenue in Upper Darby. The statement goes on to say the death was the result of “assault by […]
FIGHT CITY HALL: Welcome To The Machine
Netroots Democrats in Philadelphia are locked in a fierce fight for control of the city’s Democratic organization, though their motivations have as much to do with good governance as winning elections. Chris Bowers is a Philadelphia activist and professional blogger for MyDD.com (as in Direct Democracy), a national netroots site. A former union organizer whose first foray into partisan politics was volunteering for Dean in 2004, Bowers says he got involved locally because “no one from the Democratic Party had ever contacted me about any election in the nearly seven years I had lived [here].” And he was fed up. […]
FEDS: Ex-Seaport Museum Prez Pirated $1.5 Million
PHILADELPHIA — The former president of the Independence Seaport Museum was charged with mail fraud and tax evasion after scamming the struggling institution out of more than $1.5 million, federal authorities said Monday. John S. Carter, 57, of Osterville, Mass., submitted false invoices to fund home improvements and other personal expenses, including jewelry, electronics, clothing and a pair of rare historical artifacts, authorities said. Carter also kept the proceeds from the sale of a rare boat that had been donated to the museum, authorities said. “The defendant used the museum’s funds as his personal piggy bank,” U.S. Attorney Patrick Meehan said. […]
GAMBLOR: Nutter Talks Harm Reduction
“I am not a fan of gaming as an economic development tool. It certainly will create jobs … but I believe there are alternatives.” The candidate said he is against the sites selected for the two Philadelphia casinos. His role will be to insure the city is moving in the way to be certain it can impose the greatest restriction possible over the possible negatives from the casinos — traffic congestion, curb cuts, air quality, gambling addiction, and increases in crime to name a few. “Residents need to be protected. We have to be sure the process does not negatively […]
FIRST FRIDAY: Blessed Are The Peacekeepers
COMING OF RAGE: Photographs Of Social Change
KILLADELPHIA: Cops Bypass Gag Order Of Stop Snitchin’ By Literally Making A Federal Case Out Of It
BY SIMONE WECHSELBAUM OF THE DAILY NEWS In the age of Stop Snitchin’, Philadelphia’s embattled law-enforcement community has found that federal court is the path to justice by circumventing tight-lipped thugs and wary witnesses who jam the wheels of the criminal-justice system.The feds only need one of three things to build a case — a convicted felon caught with a gun or bullets; an individual apprehended with both a gun and a sizable amount of drugs; a person arrested for armed robbery in a store selling products made in another state and/or transported across state borders. “When we have a felon […]
GUNCRAZY: Upper Darby Cops Sold Seized Guns Back To Gun Shops Who Then Sold Them To Cop Killers
BY MARK FAZLOLLAH & JOHN SHIFFMAN INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS Hundreds of guns seized by Upper Darby police are back in circulation, many after police supplied them to two of the region’s most notorious gun shops, The Inquirer has learned. These guns included illegal sawed-off shotguns and assault rifles. Just last month, special-education students found one of Upper Darby’s confiscated guns as they collected litter near their school. One of the dealers who sold Upper Darby’s weapons is now in prison for selling guns to felons. “I don’t care if you kill a cop,” he told an undercover federal agent wearing […]
MEDIA: NJ Turnpike Authority Investigating Web Leak Of Deadly Egg Harbor Toll Crash Footage
TRENTON, N.J. – A United Kingdom-based video Web site on Saturday defended its use of graphic Garden State Parkway crash footage, even as it said it would investigate any possible ownership issues that might be raised. The New Jersey Turnpike Authority, which operates the Parkway, has been investigating how surveillance footage of the fatal May 10 crash was released, and has requested that Web sites including Youtube.com and LiveLeak.com remove the video. Hayden Hewitt, a co-founder of Manchester, England-based LiveLeak.com, said Saturday that the Web site would continue allowing the video, which depicts a car slamming into the Parkway’s Great Egg […]
We Know It’s Only Rock N’ Roll But We Like It
OLIVER’S ARMY IS HERE TO STAY: Elvis Costello, Electric Factory, Last Night, Pump It Up!
All Of This Happened While You Were Sleeping
THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS: Dude Needs 5 For Andrew Bird, Will Love You Forever, The TLA Fillmore, Last Night [FLICKR] [Photos by ERICA CORBET]
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