If Barry Melrose ever goes to Newark, he probably won't be getting a warm reception. Melrose, a hockey analyst for ESPN and a former player and manager, said some disparaging words about the city of Newark when talking about the new Devils arena on his webcast last week. Melrose said, "It looks great on the inside but don't go outside, especially if you got a wallet or anything else because the area around the building......

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: a water rescue off West St. at Battery Place in Manhattan, missing children on Grimsby St. on Staten Island, and a DOA floater in the Harlem River off Manhattan. New Yorkers may have just seen their water bill rates hiked 11.5% three months ago, but officials are now saying property owners can expect a rate increase of another 18% as early as the start of next year. Idle speculation......

Early yesterday morning, Newark authorities arrested the sixth and last suspect in the schoolyard shootings of four Newark residents that left three dead. Eighteen -year-old Melvin Jovel was arrested in Elizabeth, NJ at his family's home. He surrendered and is now being held on $2 million bail. Newark Mayor Cory Booker said, "Through collaboration with the Essex County Prosecutor's Office, the final suspect in this heinous crime has been arrested and the city is grateful.......

Cops followed suspects in the execution-style killings in a Newark schoolyard below the Mason-Dixon line. Newark Mayor Cory Booker announced that two more arrests were made in connection to the triple murder of three young residents and the attempted murder of a fourth in a schoolyard two weeks ago. Twenty-four year-old Rodolfo Godinez, was arrested in Maryland early Saturday morning, and shortly after that, his 16-year-old Alexander Alfaro was found 20 miles away in Virginia.......

Mayor Cory Booker unveiled new technology to help fight crime in Newark. The plan is called "Community Eye," and it will "marry audio gunshot-detection technology with a series of remote-control public surveillance cameras into a network," according to the Star-Ledger. Booker hopes to put 100 cameras and audio gunshot-detection machines to work, as the Newark Community Foundation has promised to raise $3.2 million for the effort. Booker said, "When all the cameras and gunshot......

Grieving families buried the three victims of last weekend's execution-style murders in Newark. Authorities also named a fourth suspect in the crimes: Rodolfo Godinez, a 24-year-old who has a record of robbery, assault, and weapons arrests. Separate funerals were held for 20-year-old Iofemi Hightower, 20-year-old Dashon Harvey, and 18-year-old Terrance Aerial. Newark Mayor Cory Booker attended all funerals, and when he spoke at Aerial's funeral, the NY Times noted that his words were a......

The Newark police arrested a third suspect in the murders of three young residents. The third suspect is 15 years old, and he will be arraigned in Family Court on charges of murder, felony murder, attempted murder and other counts, according to the Star-Ledger. He is the third suspect in custody; another 15-year-old is was arrested on Thursday and as was 28-year-old Jose Lachira Carranza, who pleaded not guilty to the crimes. The police......

Yesterday, the principal suspect in the execution-style triple murder turned himself in to Newark Mayor Cory Booker. Booker was at a press conference to announce that another suspect, a 15-year-old, had been arrested when he learned that Jose Carranza would only turn himself in to Booker. Carranza's fingerprint was found on a beer bottle at the scene of the crime, and his photograph was picked out of a photo array by the shootings' only......

Newark authorities say that the lone survivor of an execution-style shooting that left her brother and two friends dead has picked out a suspect. Nineteen-year-old Natasha Aerial, who is still in the hospital after being shot in the head, selected a suspect from a photo array. The Star-Ledger reports that the suspect was included in the array because his fingerprints were among those found on a beer bottle at the schoolyard where the shootings took......

The NY Times reports that Newark authorities may be close to naming a suspect in the Saturday night execution-style shootings of four people. Three friends were killed, while the fourth, Natasha Aerial, survived being shot in the head and has been talking to investigators. The Star-Ledger offered this description of the crime:Aeriel, her younger brother, Terrance, and two of their friends, Dashon Harvey and Iofemi Hightower, had driven to the school playground to drink,......

Nineteen-year-old Natasha Aerial, who was the only survivor from Saturday night's shootings in a Newark schoolyard, managed to speak to police yesterday. While her brother and two friends died from being shot in the head, execution-style, Aerial survived a gunshot to the head. She is heavily sedated and under police guard. Still, Newark Police Director (and former NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Operations) Garry McCarthy said, "We're getting the story piecemeal from her. Based upon......

A brutal crime took the lives of three young people and injured one more in a Newark schoolyard on Saturday night, saddening and angering the community. Twenty-year-old Iofemi Hightower, 20-year-old Dashon Harvey, and 18-year-old Terrance Aerial were "lined them up against a wall and forced...to kneel" before being shot in the head, according to Newark police. Aerial's sister Natasha was also with them, but she was shot first in another area. She survived a......

Congratulations to everyone graduating this month! As NYU's commencement was today, with speaker jazz musician Wynton Marsalis, we decided to list the many NYC commencement speakers, with help from The Chronicle of Higher Education (if we've missed any or gotten it wrong, let us know in comments): Barnard College: Anna Deveare Smith, playwright-actress CUNY Lehman College: Representative Charles Rangel CUNY Brooklyn College: Roberta S. Matthews, provost and vice president for academic affairs at Brooklyn......

-- A Brooklyn marine - who was a NY State trooper - was killed in a Baghdad firefight last week; a Queens-born soldier was mortally wounded in the same fight -- Gawker hates itself and wants to die. And they hate fruit! Those bastards. -- Newark Mayor Cory Booker didn't waste any time: His spokesman says that debit and credit card records for former Mayor Sharpe James have been subpoenaed. -- According to Forgotten-NY,......

- A study in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine shows that the lungs first responders to the September 11 attacks had the equivalent of 12 years of aging. The study continues to bolster constant claims that the World Trade Center's toxic dust had a deleterious effect on firefighters. amNew York reports the president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association as saying the city needs to help September 11's first responders: "There......

- A city rugby team that included some FDNY refused to play against the Gotham Knights gay rugby team - A brownstone gets naked - Elaborate plotting by the Bloods to kill Newark Mayor Cory Booker - A manhole explosion launched both the manhole and a construction worker into the air - The Mayor will create an office of sustainability - When you shoot a scene of Oliver Stone's World Trade Center, using a......

Cory Booker, who unsuccessfully ran for Mayor of Newark a few years ago in a bitter race against longtime mayor Sharpe James, was elected by a huge margin to lead the 64th biggest city in the country. His opponent, NJ State Senator Ronald Rice, (who was outspent and outmatched) conceded around 10PM; the Star-Ledger notes he didn't mention Booker by name. Booker will be only the third new Mayor of Newark in 36 years, and......

Although we wouldn't want to drown ourselves too much in a gigantic lake of hyperbole, a peak at this weekend's local film offerings is enough to make any cinephile utterly giddy. The New York Film Festival will be wrapping up with a tremendous program including what is billed as Michelangelo Antonioni's "preferred cut" of his classic 1975 Jack Nicholson starrer The Passenger. (We'll have a final bit of NYFF coverage tomorrow.) Plus, two of our......