The Ruins of Trenton

More mind-numbing violence shattered the peace in some of Trenton’s worst neighborhoods this weekend, once again.

But former Police Director Joseph Santiago was apparently too busy to meet with his command staff on Sunday to implement some emergency measures to address the situation, law enforcement sources said.

Numerous violent episodes plagued the city, but perhaps the most horrific was the shooting of a 16-year-old city resident who happened to be tooling his way down Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard at around 3 a.m. Sunday morning.

The Trentonian reported that attackers dragged the boy off of his bicycle and unloaded two slugs into his head, making permanent brain damage and the loss of sight of at least one of the child’s eyes highly likely, despite the best efforts of the valiant medical staff if Capital Health System-Fuld Campus.

Mr. Santiago’s leadership in the police department seems to be deteriorating even more rapidly than has become usual for the summer, as the unaccountable director has cut manpower in many of the city’s worst areas while doing nothing to stop the endless summer violence filling the pages of newspapers with each successive day.

Rumors have it that Mr. Santiago plans on announcing a separation from his wife, followed by taking up another kind of pseudo-residency hotel or apartment arrangements that he took up in the beginning of his tenure in Trenton.

Residents need to write to their mayor and City Council and demand the removal of this monster, who like others in the city administration, fail to put real effort into creating viable solutions for a smallish city that probably could be turned around fairly rapidly.

New leadership in both the police department and the city is needed, ASAP.