Red Bank reacts to hip-hop melee
Some residents say they no longer feel safe on streets
BY MELISSA KARSH Staff Writer
After a recent hip-hop event at a West Front Street club erupted into a street brawl involving several hundred people, the club owner has agreed to a change in music programming.

Red Bank Mayor Pasquale Menna said the owner of Chubby's Waterside Café, where the Oct. 13 melee took place, agreed to a borough sanctioned ban on hip-hop concerts.

"As a matter of fact, directives have gone out … in terms of restrictions, in terms of Chubby's," Menna said last week. "There's been an ongoing dialogue between the owner of Chubby's and the police department in terms of how we are going to deal with this."

Red Bank police called for backup to deal with the unruly crowd outside Chubby's, and law enforcement personnel from several neighboring towns as well as Fort Monmouth responded.

Despite the fact that a Red Bank police officer was injured, there were no arrests made.

"I can assure you that the police department is working comprehensively on all of these issues," Menna said. "We had a couple of incidents which were obviously not planned and there's no way even in the most secure and the best situations in the world you can prevent everything, but we are dealing with it."

Menna also said what happened outside Chubby's was an isolated incident and would not be repeated.

"It's my understanding that there is possibly an application that will be filed very shortly to eliminate that use by the applicant," said Menna. He said the application would be to change the use of Chubby's from a nightclub to a restaurant.

The incident outside Chubby's followed a few weeks of reports regarding two attempted sexual assaults, one occurring near the intersection of Branch Avenue and Tower Hill Avenue and the other occurring on Monmouth Street, and an assault reported in Marine Park.

Commenting on the Chubby's incident in a letter to the editor, a resident said the street fighting is part of a larger picture that makes her feel unsafe walking in her Mechanic Street neighborhood after dark.

"Red Bank is now experiencing an insta-urbanization," said J.B. Brune. "I think the town is completely unprepared for the rapid growth that it has experienced in last seven years. It's growing so fast that everything else needs to catch up with it … the services need to catch up with it."

Councilman John P. Curley echoed this sentiment at Monday night's Borough Council meeting.

"You have people in this community feeling unsafe to walk the streets at night," said Curley. He said he fields calls from residents who fear for their safety and suggested that borough programs be expanded and consideration should be given to community policing and foot patrols.

However Menna had a different take on the situation, saying that there was no reason for fear in Red Bank.

"It is safe. I do walk the streets at night. Red Bank is a walkable town," said Menna at the council meeting.

Menna said last week that the crime statistics for 2007 so far this year are "very encouraging" and show a decrease in crime from the comparable period of 2006.

The police department has more current crime statistics than those reported in the N.J. State Police 2006 Uniform Crime Report, according to Red Bank Police Capt. Stephen McCarthy, who cited crime reports from Jan. 1 to Sept. 30.

"I can tell you that in 2007, now we only had these statistics up to the third quarter … we have seen a decrease compared to 2006," said McCarthy.

The total crime index for the borough for the first nine months of 2007 is 249, compared to 291 crimes occurring during the same time period in 2006.

This represents an approximately 14 percent decrease in total crime from 2006 to 2007 so far, McCarthy said.

Violent crime reported in the borough to date in 2007 is 29, as compared to 37 in 2006, a decrease of approximately 21 incidents from 2006 to 2007.

Non-violent crimes reported so far in 2007 number 220 incidents, compared to 254 for the same time period in 2006, a 13 percent decrease.

The total crime rate so far for 2007 is 20.9 per 1,000 residents, compared to 24.5 per 1,000 for the same period in 2006, according to McCarthy.

The violent crime rate so far for 2007 is 2.4 per 1,000 residents, as compared to 3.1 per 1,000 for the same time period in 2006. The non-violent crime rate so far for 2007 is 18.5 as compared to 21.4 for the same time period in 2006, Mc- Carthy said.

"It was up a little bit in 2006 and 2007 seems to be corrected back," he said. "2005 was the lowest [crime] has been since 1990, so 2005 was an extremely low year so when you compare an extremely low year to 2006, which was busier, you going to have a much larger increase percentage-wise," said McCarthy.

Menna commended the 41-officer Red Bank Police Department at the council meeting for the handling of the incident outside Chubby's last week, which included fights involving at least 15 people at a time some of whom turned on officers who attempted to break them up.

Red Bank police had to request mutual aid from surrounding police departments to assist in restoring order to the West Front Street area between Broad Street and English Plaza, according to Red Bank police. Officers responded from Middletown, Tinton Falls, Shrewsbury, Little Silver, Rumson, Fair Haven and Fort Monmouth police departments, according to police.

"We hope that these incidents don't have to be repeated again but if they do arise there is a mechanism in place and it actually worked the way the system was designed," said Menna of the police department's use of mutual aid.

According to police, Red Bank police officers began to notice large groups of subjects arriving in the area of Chubby's, which was having a live performance at a hip-hop party event, and then gathering outside the nightspot at around 1:56 p.m.

The crowd, which included several hundred people and 20 police officers from Red Bank and other towns, made the street impassible to motor vehicle traffic, according to a press release from the police department.

The scene was cleared after approximately 30 minutes, no arrests were made during the incident and no property damage was reported.

"The reason there were no arrests at the time was that when you have a limited number of personnel and you have that many people, to break away officers to transport a prisoner, you are reducing your force," said McCarthy. "So our primary responsibility is to protect the public and the property, and if we begin to reduce our force too much, we won't be able to effectively do that."

Red Bank Police Sgt. Richard Mangold, the officer injured during the skirmish, was treated and released at Riverview Medical Center, according to police.

McCarthy said last week, for privacy reasons, he could not comment on the types of injuries Mangold sustained but that he was treated and released.

"[Mangold] was attempting to stop someone who was trying to prevent officers from breaking up the fight," said McCarthy. He added that no weapons were involved.