Lakewood Police along with Ocean County authorities arrested five men and seized more than a kilogram of cocaine, more than $100,000 in cash and weapons after executing several search warrants Tuesday.
Those arrested are:
Larry Negron, 32, resides at 139 Colonial Drive
Paris Aguirre, 27, resides at 139 Colonial Drive
Maximino Madrigada, resides at 215 Elm Street
Julio Magna Estrada, resides at 215 Elm Street
Enrique Miguel-Asciendo, 42, resides at 125 Mountain View Drive
The suspects are charged with possession of cocaine and possession of more than 5 ounces of cocaine with intent to distribute. They have all been booked in the Ocean County Jail in Toms River, and bail amounts range from $20,000 to $150,000 bail, set by Superior Court Judge Barbara Ann Villano.
The investigation took about two months, county authorities reported. It is continuing, and more arrests are expected, they said.
YWN received countless emails on Thursday afternoon from Lakewood residents living in the area, telling us that they do not feel safe. Less then two weeks ago, YWN reported (HERE) that the LPD had made a large-scale drug bust, seizing more than 400 grams of cocaine at a township home. That home was also owned by a Frum Yid.
In July this past summer, YWN posted an extensive article along with a letter – signed by leading Lakewood Rabbonim, and undersigned by the Posek Hador, Maran Hagon Rav Elyashiv Shlita – regarding “unsavory rentals”. Click HERE to read the original article.
The letter stated as follows: “In light of the many unfortunate episodes that have taken place in town, and in response to the continuous complaints that have come to our attention, we issue this urgent call to the bnei Torah of our kehilla kedosha of Lakewood in order to raise awareness of a pressing matter that has been causing emotional pain and physical damage to the tzibur of Lakewood for many years.
Many individuals have purchased homes in areas that over the years have been built up until the majority of the neighborhood has been converted to a yiddishe shechuna. Yet, these owners continue to rent out their units to unsavory individuals, and by doing so, cause damage and pain to the entire neighborhood in ways which need not be elaborated. Others have done worse, by purchasing units in areas that they know are quickly becoming an attractive location for bnei Torah families or even in areas that have already been firmly established as such. These opportunistic latecomers are certainly the direct cause of damage and unjustified hardship for the entire neighborhood, both physically and spiritually.
In many situations it is halachically incumbent upon these owners to promptly remove their obstacle from the public. Even in cases where perhaps there isn’t a clear halachic enforceable mandate, nevertheless, ain ruach chachomim nocheh heimenu. Regarding situations such as these, the Gemorrah states that Yerushalayim was destroyed because people insisted on not going beyond the enforceable letter of the law.
Such people should fear placing themselves in the category of mazikei harabim and should be wary of shouldering the awesome responsibility of such actions. It is well-known that one who, G-d forbid, brings pain to others causes the middas hadin to take hold. How can he remain indifferent in face of the pain he’s causing others? Even Yom Kippur won’t atone until he appeases the one who was wronged! Certainly among bnei Torah there is an added element of chillul Hashem involved. It is clear that no blessings can rest upon ventures of this nature.
Therefore, anybody who owns such dwellings should promptly rid themselves of these investments, even in place of a loss. In the interim, they are obligated to demand from their tenants to live up to neighborhood standards. Anyone with the ability to influence these owners in any way possible should do so and fulfill a mitzvah of zikui harabim in this pressing matter. Certainly, one should seek to be counted amongst the mezakai harabim rather than be amongst those who place fear and pain on the tzibur.
To those who abide by the above and fulfill the mitzvah of ve’ahavta leracha komocha, which forms the basis of the entire Torah, may Hashem bestow blessing and success in all of their financial and spiritual matters. May we see the fulfillment of the verse hinei mah tov umah na’im sheves achim gam yachad.”
Signed,
Rav Aryeh Malkiel Kotler
Rav Yeruchom Olshin
Rav Dovid Schustal
Rav Yisroel Neumann
Rav Yaakov Forscheimer
Rav Mattisyahu Salamon
Rav Dovid Feinstein
Rav Gavriel Finkel
Rav Avrohom Spitzer
Rav Osher Chaim Lieberman
Rav Shlomo Gissinger
Rav Shmuel Blech
Rav Shlomo Miller
Rav Yissocher Dov Kahan
Added note from Hagon Rav Elyashiv Shlita:
“BSD: Due to the Hachlata of Gedolei Yisroel in Golah (outside of Eretz Yisroel) regarding the city Lakewood, to prevent the renting of homes to individuals who are causing damage and pain to the Tzibur (community) – both physically & spirtually – I too join with them, Bnei Yisroel should not do “an avlah”, and should listen to words of Rabonim and in turn be blessed.”
Click HERE to read view the actual letter.
(Eli Gefen – YWN / APP)
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22 Responses
Unfortunately,no matter what the rabbonim say,the owners will rent to anyone that pays. The law of the land forbids discrimination. Once the tenant does not pay or makes trouble,take him to court. We Jews do NOT own the towns we live in. We also do not want other non-Jewish landlords to refuse to rent to us because they don’t like our type.
Thank you YWN for having the guts keep it coming!
To #1
You can refuse to rent based on criminal history, as long as you are consistent. These drug dealers you can be sure have some type of rap sheet. Obviously they don’t care about having criminals.
This is nothing more than a smear by the “askunim” 139 Colonial Drive and 125 Mountain View Drive, are barely in Lakewood. This is nothing more than some people jumping on an arrest and making a big deal over nothing.
What’s the rule? If your zip code is 08701 then your house is automatically subject to the “vaad laws”?
You don’t even need to research their criminal history. You are forbidden from discriminating based upon sex, race, religion, national origin, etc. You are not forbidden to refuse to rent based upon the fact the person does not exclusively wear a white long sleeved shirt, or some other criterion you can make up.
yoina,
Your mistaken! 139 Colonial Drive and 125 Mountain View Drive is in the midst of a thriving frum neighborhood! There are over 50 frum families in the neighborhood KA’H! on those blocks alone there are over 20 families!!
This area is infested with overcrowded “frum” owned rentals – to illegal’s, and drugs.
etc!!
Stop this lashon hora already that you refer to as news!
In the midst of a thriving neighborhood on the very edge of lakewood, at rt. 70, that frum yidden started moving there maybe 1 year ago. Give me a break.
The last time YWN posted their reporting regarding this topic was irresponsible and malicious. “Frum yid hosts…” was the headline.
Fact. The home that was rented where that “unsavory” individual lived, was actually not hosting or renting to him at all. That home, (already rented for twenty years to non-Jews, long before any Jews moved near that neighborhood), was rented to a non-Jewish lady with no criminal issues whatsoever. That lady, for extra cash, decided to rent a room in her house to this individual, without the landlord’s knowledge or consent.
Again, the Landlord had no idea that a room was being sublet to a second tenant. Do your research – I am right.
So YWN, decided not to research the facts, and posted a seemingly outrageous headline on this popular topic, that was guaranteed to get many hits. Now its time to ask mechilah from that person whose reputation you smeared. (Yes, its quite easy to find out on-line who owns the property)
I have a feeling that’s not going to happen.
This time the headline is “graciously hosted”. The clear connotation is that the evil landlord knowingly and willingly graciously invited these wonderful villains as his personal guests. Are they the lease-holders? Do these tenants have known previous serious criminal activity?
Elm Street? No one in their sane mind would walk in that area. Right off Martin Luther King Blvd, its literally Harlem.
YWN’s credibility on this topic is worthless.
But hey – it sure gets a lot of hits….
YWN, Are you going to apologize like the Washington post for being biased against the landlords?
yoina,
Do you know anything about this area at all? There are close to 60 frum families living in that neighborhood and they started moving in over 6 years ago. On Colonial Drive alone half the houses are occupied by frum families.
I suggest that you do your research before posting your nonsense.
Oh #9 news to me no frum yidden in the martin Luther neighborhood! oh my mistake its loaded with frum yidden use you head for a change, just because there are none on that block? oh so the criminals just stay on their block they dont walk anywhere in the area?! i’m just trying to use your line of reasoning
and to those who think this is loshon hara this one is totally not i went line by line with all the 7 conditions in sefer chafetz chaim and this is one case where its actually a mitzva
#4 yoina there are plenty of yidden there, and not everything u don’t like has to be blamed on the vaad and if u don’t like this town u can move out ! !!! And THANK YOU YW for posting this stuff maybe after enough storys the landlords will have enough of everyone talking about them and they will do something.
This reminds me of what some “frum”yidden did to the Bronx Many decades ago.
They turned 4 family homes into boarding houses and filled them with PR’s.
Within a decade the East Bronx was lost.
All the landlord bloggers should stop pointing fingers at YWN and look in the mirror. Lakewood is not what it was even a few years ago, even a lot of bad neighborhoods have now frum yidden living in or near these neighborhoods. Maybe you should say to yourself that I should listen to the gedolim, it’s not just the Rosh Yeshivos of BMG saying this. Maybe you should reconsider renting to unsavory characters. Many yidden will now rent or buy in almost any neighborhood, and if you can’t find yidden -there are many ways to weed out the bad from the decent goyim. There are many companies online that offer background checks, and I’m sure there are many other ways to find out what is going on with your property. Stop putting your head in the sand and pretending that you’ve done all your histadlus. Also, your financial income is not more important than ruining someone’s neighborhood. Also, stop with
this business “I was there first”, let them live
somewhere else. If you want them to live somewhere else -why don’t you switch your mansion down 14th St. or wherever you live with their house. After one week in that neighborhood, you’ll
wonder how one Jew can treat another Jew this way and allow this to go on. BTW, that lawsuit you had against the township with regards to cleaning up properties was a total chillul Hashem. You knew it had nothing to do with discrimination!
GIVE US NAMES! LETS KNOW WHO RENTS TO THE DREGS OF SOCIETY.
To all who blame the “vaad” about the rabbonims letter about slum lords – you are wrong. Please don’t give them any credit as one of the vaad members is a slum lord himself. I know 100% a fact they were not involved and felt the letter caused more problems.
After the letter came one vaad member told me they were considering coming out with a new initiative demanding certain responsibilities for landlords such as criminal checks….NOTHING HAPPENED- WHATS NEW
On another note in the past week hundreds of thousands of cash dollars plus extremely large amounts of drugs have been taken during many police arrests in areas that are center of Lakewood and predominantly Jewish. I am not sure why this is happening now and what allowed the police more leeway to make such arrests . YWN is only listing one arrest of several drug, guns and gang arrests that have taken place in the past week,.
A suspect murderer (who was on parole for selling drugs)was also arrested this week for trying to kill a witness and instead killed someone else in the house. This and on of the drug arrests took plce on Maple Avenue which is right near Ridge and Park so give me a break all the complainers
It’s a mitzvah to publicize all the names of these slum lords. They have had enough time to clean shop of anyone with criminal records or gang activity. .I dont care were in lakewood- You are allowing the criminals/gangs/drug dealers to make the entire Lakewood unsafe.
PUT up cameras at your properties to make sure no one is doing criminal/drug activity or being roundy at 2 am and waking up all the neighboors especialy on shabbos or even during the middle of the week. Trust me they wont.
Some in our area have clean shopped because of the letter and some were done because we the residents posted signs with their name, called them day and night and had the police coming over to the house for any nuisance that created noise or disturbance that were not normal or peaceful. Its called the Quality of Life police officer.
We don’t have to live in fear when you the slum lord live in peace. Take responsibility
We had a meeting with over 50 people showed up to voice their concerns to Chief Lawson and guess what there is a significant improvement . Yes we NOW need to remind the police force once again. If no one calls to notify them of issues they will look at other neighborhoods that need And WANT help. The police stated, to always call for anything as they track each call and it all gets entered into a system that reports patterns of criminal activity so they can properly assign the force to patrol those specific areas that need attention based on the amount of calls and type of complaints..
. MANY OF THESE CRIMINALS/DRUG DEALERS /GANGS ONLY LIVE IN LAKEWOOD BECAUSE NO ONE ELSE WILL WANT TO RENT TO THEM IN ANY OTHER TOWN. READ THE BLOGS ON APP.COM. LAKEWOOD IS KNOWN FOR THE BIGGEST CRIMINAL GANGESTERS AROUND. MANY NON JEWS ARE AFRAID TO EVEN CONSIDER LIVING OR VISITING LAKEWOOD BECAUSE OF THE GANGS AND CRIMINAL ACTIVITY INCLUDING DRUGS, MURDER AND OTHER THINGS THAT CAN NOT BE POSTED HERE.
NOT TO MENTION WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO DOWNTOWN WHICH USED TO BE A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO SHOP JUST A FEW YEARS AGO.I WAS THERE TONIGHT ON 2nd STREET TO GET MEDICINE AT THE PHARMACY AND IT IS TOTAL LAWLESNESS- THAT’S WHY MANY OF THE JEWISH STORES ARE MOVING AWAY.
http://criminalsearches.com/default.aspx
Interesting discussion:
Is one allowed to accept money that was earned from a chillul h-Shem?
Does it matter if you know?
Does it matter if you pretend you don’t know?
If you find money, do you try to find out where it came from?
Is it a kiddush h-Shem to be a slum lord… ANYWHERE???
Ask your Rav, I guess. But make sure you are asking the right question!!
Is one allowed to lower property values in a neigborhood, by circumventing zoning laws?
If you steal my property value, does that make you a thief, or me a kvetch!?
(Yes, its quite easy to find out on-line who owns the property)
Maybe it’s time to stop throwing around blame?
Im H-Shem lo yivne Bayis… shum amlu bonav bo… Im H-shem lo yishmor ir… shav shakkad Shomer.
LETOELES HARABIM: to find out who owns a property in lkwd – goto ocnjtax.com and click on “OC.TaxRecords.com” on the left nav.
dont you know that the criticism of communal responsibility can only be leveled at homeowners and not publishers who pass along unresearched claims that dont verify all the details. heaven forbid that we should be consistent that may chalila lead to moshiach coming.do we really want that to happen?!
How many of these landlords are involved in tghe drug business? How many Jews are doing drugs or selling them? How can a landlord throw out a tenant who consistently pays rent on time and after moving in starts selling drugs but there were no Jews living in that area when he came in? You cannot simply throw people out or refuse to rent to them because you don’t like them. It is against the law!