A South Paterson jewelry store was robbed. Its owners say they still never see police

PATERSON — A well-organized group of burglars broke into a South Paterson jewelry store last week and made off with what the owners say was more than $1.5 million worth of gold merchandise.

The thieves used a crowbar and cutter to break the locks at the Ramadan International jewelry store on Getty Avenue, while blocking the views of most of the security cameras outside the business, its owners said.

Footage from one of the store’s indoor security cameras showed a burglar smashing through the glass on the bottom of the front door. Four masked men then stooped down through the makeshift entrance to get inside.

The burglars stole the contents of five jewelry display cases, including gold rings, gold belts, gold bangles, bracelets and chains, the owners said. The burglars were in and out of the store in 23 seconds, the owners said.

CBS News aired a story about the burglary Monday night.

The New Jersey Attorney General’s Office waited more than five days before issuing a statement confirming the basic details of the crime, even though Paterson Press started asking state authorities for information about the burglary less than four hours after it happened.

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State officials did not immediately provide an explanation of why it took so long for them to announce the crime. The Attorney General’s Office has been handling news releases regarding public safety in Paterson since the state took control of the city Police Department on March 27.

In a statement issued at 7:14 p.m. on Monday, May 22, the Attorney General’s Office said the burglary happened at 4:42 a.m. on May 17 at 434 Getty Ave.

“Officers reviewed video at the scene and continue to pursue investigative leads,” the Attorney General’s Office said.

Members of the Ramadan family, the store’s owners, said Paterson police rarely patrol their area of the city.

“You can sit here all day and you will see no police,” said Mike Ramadan, nodding toward Getty Avenue. “We get very little protection here. We pay taxes for it, but we don’t see them.”

Ramadan’s comments echoed the complaints lodged by residents of Paterson’s Hillcrest neighborhood, on the other side of the city, during a listening session on May 15 with Isa Abbassi, whom the Attorney General’s Office has put in charge of the municipal Police Department.

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At the Abbassi session, Hillcrest residents said their calls for police response routinely get scant attention as authorities focus on Paterson’s high-crime neighborhoods.

Ruby Ramadan from the Getty Avenue store said she was upset that Mayor Andre Sayegh had not reached out to the business after the burglary.

“He’s the mayor. He’s supposed to come and give us support,” she said. “He never even called.”

Sayegh said he was not aware of the jewelry store burglary, which took place in the election district he had represented on the City Council for a decade. The mayor said he gets notified only about shootings and homicides.

Last October, another South Paterson jewelry store, on Main Street, was the target of an armed robbery in which thieves allegedly took more than $1 million in goods.

Sayegh said that after the Main Street robbery, then-acting Police Chief Engelbert Ribeiro deployed “extra attention” patrols in the South Paterson area. As part of the state takeover, Ribeiro was reassigned to the state’s Police Training Academy in Trenton earlier this month.

The mayor said he believes the extra attention effort in South Paterson stopped after the Police Department began conducting walking patrols on Main Street.

Joe Malinconico is editor of Paterson Press.

Email: editor@patersonpress.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Paterson NJ jewelry store robbery: Owners still don't see police