Quote:

How about we put this skumbag away for good this time before someone he kills someone?

16-year old charged in Jersey City gang-recruitment related shooting

by Michaelangelo Conte/The Jersey Journal
Friday March 20, 2009, 11:21 PM
Shooting suspect suspect Jamal King.

A 17-year-old Jersey City boy charged with shooting a 16-year-old in violence related to street gang recruitment will be charged as an adult and the state hopes to include the charge of attempted murder, officials said.


Jamil King, 17, of Garfield and Myrtle avenues, was arrested on Oct. 20 and charged with aggravated assault and weapons offenses in the shooting of the Bergen Avenue boy five days earlier at Atlantic Avenue and Martin Luther King Drive, Hudson County Assistant Prosecutor Steven Dill said today.

The victim said Yusef Washington, 24, of Bartholdi Avenue, approached him and tried to recruit him into the Mob Piru Bloods set and the gang member became angry after the boy expressed interest but never followed through, Dill said. The boy said he didn't like the way Washington and King treated people, Dill said.

The boy told police that on the night he was shot in the thigh, King, Washington and five other boys road up to him on bicycles and King took out a silver handgun and opened fire, Dill said. Although uncooperative at first, the victim eventually identified King as the shooter and Washington as the person who tried to recruit him, Dill said.

The shooting followed an incident two days earlier when four boys assaulted the 16-year-old, Dill said. The boy said that after that attack he was approached by Washington, who made statements that led the boy to believe Washington was behind the attack.

Based on the boy's statement, a warrant was issued for Washington's arrest on charges including recruiting someone to join a gang and promoting street crime, officials said. He was arrested Wednesday after a chase that resulted in the additional charges of burglary, resisting arrest and obstructing a government function, officials said.

Dill said the state is considering charging Washington with conspiracy to commit murder, Dill said. When the case against King is presented to a grand jury on April 1, prosecutors will seek to indict King on the charge of attempted murder, Dill said, adding that King is being charged as an adult based on the seriousness of the crime.

Washington was in prison from June 17, 2005, to Feb. 28, 2006, and April 12, 2007, to Feb. 29, 2008, on convictions for unlawful possession of a handgun and three drug offenses, state corrections officials said. He was still on parole when arrested this week and he is also charged with a parole violation based on drug charge, Dill said.

Jersey City cops: Breaking and entering suspect hid in a tree

by Michaelangelo Conte/The Jersey Journal
Thursday March 19, 2009



A Jersey City criminal broke into a residence, hid in a tree, and then under a bush, before he was arrested on warrants and new charges Wednesday night, officials said.

Yusef Washington, 24, of Bartholdi Avenue, was arrested at 9:27 p.m. in a backyard on Wade Street and charged with burglary, resisting arrest and obstructing a government function, officials said yesterday.

Officers responding on Wednesday to shots being fired approached Washington at Van Nostrand and Ocean avenues because he fit the gunman's description, reports said.

Washington ran, clutching his waistband as if armed, reports said.

With police close behind, he kicked down the door of a nearby home and slammed it in the officers' faces before climbing out a window and up a tree in the backyard, reports said.

When cops spotted him in the branches he jumped over a fence and briefly disappeared into the darkness, reports said.

But he was spotted after police flooded the area with lights, reports said.

He took off running again, but officers dragged him to the ground after a scuffle, reports said. No weapon was found.

On Oct. 20, Washington was charged with recruiting someone to join a gang and promoting organized street crime, said Hudson County Deputy First Assistant Prosecutor Debra Simon.

Before that, on June 27, a warrant for his arrest for a violation of parole was issued in connection with a drug charge, Simon said.

Washington was in prison from June 17, 2005 to Feb. 28, 2006 and April 12, 2007 to Feb. 29, 2008 on convictions for unlawful possession of a handgun and three drug offenses, state corrections officials said.