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WEATHER TONIGHT Gradual Clearing, Much Cooler. Low of 20.
The Westfield News Serving Westfield, Southwick, and the surrounding Hilltowns
www.thewestfieldnews.com
VOL. 82 NO. 299
Candy includes surprise By Carl E. Hartdegen Staff Writer WESTFIELD – In what appears to be once-in-a-lifetime event, a city woman has found a prescription pill in a bag of candy. City police report that at 3:37 p.m. Thursday a Pleasant Street resident came to the station to report that his wife had found a foreign object in a bag of M&M’s he had bought at the Family Dollar Store on Franklin Street. Lt. Jerome Pitoniak reports that the man said that he had bought a bag of plain M&Ms for his wife but when she started to eat the candies (which Pitoniak Siad were red, white and blue and may have been a leftover patriotic version manufactured for Independence Day) she found one that was hard and tasted wrong. When she examined it, the unusual find appeared to be a pill. The resident then brought the candy, and the foreign object, to the police department where Pitoniak reports the pill appears to be a metformin 500 milligram tablet. Internet research shows that metformin is a widely prescribed oral antidiabetic drug. He said that the pill was not candycoated and did not appear to have been through the entire manufacturing process. “It looked like a loose pill in the bag” Pitoniak said, “it’s basically the same size as an M&M”. He went on to say “It had some color” but explained that he thought the color had probably been transferred to the pill from the candies it was in contact with and was not due to a manufacturing process. He said he immediately called the contact number on the bag and spoke with company officials of the chocolate division of Mars Inc. “They were very good”, he said and explained to him the “clean room” procedures that the workers in the plant follow when they report for work and said that they are not allowed to take any personal property at all into the manufacturing area. Nonetheless, Pitoniak was told, the workers are not frisked and it would not be hard to sneak a pill on to the manufacturing floor. He said that because the code on the bag was incomplete the spokesperson could not tell him the time of day or the machine which processed the suspect bag but did determine that it was made on Tuesday, March 10, 1913 at the plant in Hackttstown, N.J. Pitoniak, stressing that it was only his guess, suggested that probably what
MONDAY, DECEMBER 23, 2013
HOMEWARD BOUND
Tracks in the snow on the southeast corner of the intersection of Root and North roads indicate where a pickup truck sailed over the guard rail and came to rest against the front steps of the house early Saturday morning. (Photo © 2013 Carl E. Hartdegen)
Guardrail ineffective By Carl E. Hartdegen Staff Writer WESTFIELD – A guardrail installed in the front yard of a house at the intersection of North and Root roads to protect the dwelling from vehicles was not effective early Saturday morning when an out-of-control pickup truck flew over the barrier to strike the house. No significant damage appeared to have been done to the dwelling. City police reports that the resident called at 12:39 a.m. Saturday to report the crash. Officer Zachary Demers responded to the accident and reports that a witness who came upon the crash moments after it occurred and stopped to offer assistance recorded the registration number of the truck before it fled the scene. Demers discovered that the black 2003 GMC Sierra pickup truck had been eastbound on North Road and transited the fourway intersection without stopping and failed to negotiate the curve of the intersection. He found that the pickup became airborne after it struck the snow bank on the southeast
corner of the intersection, passing over and damaging the upper portion of the guardrail before striking the front steps of the house. There is a distance of four/five feet on the inside of the guardrail where there are no tracks in the snow, presumably where the truck was airborne. The truck appears to have damaged only the railing on the steps of the house. The witness told Demers that the fleeing vehicle dropped a driveshaft which he recovered. A dispatcher reports that when he spoke with the registered owner, an Agawam woman, by phone, she claimed to be operating the vehicle in Northampton while she was speaking and said she had not been involved in a crash. The woman then hung up and further attempts to speak with her have not been successful. The witness said that the operator he had seen was a male party. A Granville resident, Nicholaas Vangelder, 19, subsequently came to the station and admitted responsibility for the crash.
See Candy, Page 3
Mom, boyfriend GOVERNOR Patrick due in court in missing boy case FITCHBURG, Mass. (AP) — A Massachusetts mother and her boyfriend are due in court for dangerousness hearings as police and relatives continue searching for her 5-year-old son. Elsa Oliver of Fitchburg is charged with reckless endangerment of a child and being an accessory after the fact. Her boyfriend, Alberto Sierra, is charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and assault and battery on a child. They’ve pleaded not guilty. Oliver’s son, Jeremiah, was last seen by relatives in September and is feared dead. Authorities learned about the boy’s disappearance only recently. Oliver and Sierra are due in Fitchburg District Court Tuesday. Both are being held without bail. Jeremiah’s father, Jose Oliver of New Britain, Conn., searched for his son Saturday in Fitchburg with relatives and friends, but didn’t find any clues.
More responsible in missing-boy case
STEVE LeBLANC Associated Press BOSTON (AP) — Responsibility in the case of a 5-year-old boy who has been missing for months and is feared dead could go beyond a fired social worker and her supervisor, Gov. Deval Patrick suggested on Friday. The family of Jeremiah Oliver received great care from a different social worker at the state Department of Children & Families until the end of last year, Patrick said. The family’s care went downhill after the case was transferred to another office, he said on WGBH-FM radio. He said no case worker is too overworked to raise alarm bells if he or she believes a family is in trouble. Instead, he said, a representation was made that the family was fine and in a new furnished apartment even though no one had one gone to see it.
Governor Deval Patrick “Being busy doesn’t explain that,” Patrick said. See Missing Boy, Page 3
“You can always spot a well-informed man — his views are the same as yours.” — Ilka Chase
75 cents
Paper Mill Road acceptance hearing slated By Dan Moriarty Staff Writer WESTFIELD – The City Council has slated a public hearing for Jan. 16 to present details of the Paper Mill Road improvement project and the city’s home rule petition to the state legislature to declare the road a legal public way. The hearing was originally slated to be held Thursday, Dec 19, but was postponed to the January meeting to comply with state notification requirements. Ward 6 Councilor Christopher Crean, who represents the residents and who has pushed for the road acceptance petition, said this morning that there was an oversight in the public notification process. “We thought we just had to hold the hearing (Thursday),” Crean said. “But we didn’t do it because of a (legal) clause that we have to send letters (of notification) to all of the abuttors.” “It was an oversight on our part,” Crean said. “The city clerk’s office is going through the process (of identifying abuttors) and will notify them by mail for the Jan. 16 meeting.” “These people have been waiting patiently for almost 25 years,” Crean said. “We hit a little glitch, but we’ll have the hearing and send the petition to the state legislature. We’re a little closer to getting that road fixed.” The City Council initiated a home rule petition process in November seeking authorization from the state legislature to “consider Paper Mill Road to be a public way” to facilitate a road improvement project. The issue is that the city cannot use Chapter 90 funding from the state to improve unaccepted streets. Paper Mill Road residents own to the middle of the pavement, so each resident has to agree to surrender their property interest for the property under the roadway to the city, and expensive and time-consuming process. The city has held a number of public information meetings at the Paper Mill Road Elementary School on that process. Many of the residents signed agreements surrendering their property right, but several have declined to participate in that process which would have required the city to take the property currently under the roadway through eminent domain. Residents could challenge that in court, further delaying road improvements. Crean has pushed to find a quicker solution to improve the roadway used by residents, See Paper Mill Road, Page 3
Noble Hospital Wins Gold WESTFIELD – Noble Hospital won two Gold Aster Awards for Newspaper Advertising Series and Internal Advertising Campaign. An annual competition, the Aster Awards recognizes the nation’s more talented healthcare marketing professionals for outstanding excellence in advertising. Every year entries designed, printed, and/or distributed the previous year are scored by a panel of industry experts for Best of Show; Judges Choice; and Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards in their respective categories. Noble Hospital and ad agency LogicTrail won Gold for their “Did You Know” newspaper advertising series in addition to their internal “Yes, Noble” campaign. “Although it’s not the goal of what we do here, it feels great to be recognized by our peers,” said Chief Marketing Officer Alexander Simon of LogicTrail. “We’ve been able to leverage the broad expertise of Noble’s marketing professionals and they have trusted us to deliver a head-turning creative strategy.” “The work we are doing is part of a longterm marketing communications plan and we are thrilled to be recognized at such a high level,” said Allison Gearing-Kalill, vice president of community development at Noble Hospital. “The campaigns are simply a reflection of the many dedicated people within this organization.” The Gold winning campaigns are part of a strategic plan that continue throughout 2014. Both of the campaigns can be viewed at: www. noblehospital.org/asterawards.