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TRESSPASSING, FORGIVEN

"Pastor" David Crapnell parachuted into Niagara Falls from Western Ohio wearing a cheap brown suit manufactured by slave labor in China, bringing his chunky wife and anti-Semitic views to the Empire State sometime back in 2009. He looked all around and decided that the biggest problem we had here was Howard Milstein.

But let's give Crapnell the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he hasn't been here long enough to notice that nearly 50 percent of the available housing is vacant, that kids are killing each other in the streets over rocks of crack, or that the property taxes here are higher proportionately than they are anyplace else in the whole United States.

Maybe he isn't aware that the rampant corruption at City Hall -- which led to our last mayor's imprisonment and most of our current mayor's myriad problems -- makes doing legitimate business here all but impossible.

No. For Crapnell, the worst thing about this place is Milstein, who lives 400 miles away and has invested somewhere in the neighborhood of $50 million here over the past decade. Crapnell and his aforementioned wife run something called NOAH, which is a front group for the Gamaliel Foundation, a leftist national organization that makes its money shaking down rich people.

They do it like this: If you give them money, they won't protest against you. Simple as that. It's been very effective in many parts of the country.

Last week, Crapnell led about 30 of our city's many unemployed citizens to one of Milstein's properties, where they trespassed and loitered. The newspapers showed up, of course, and instead of a story about a unanimous state Senate vote for Milstein as the new chairman of the Thruway Authority -- which happened at the same time -- there were stories about Crapnell, his chunky wife and his 30 jobless acolytes.

According to the papers, they were there to "mock" Milstein and Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who made the appointment.

While we hope they had a good time on Milstein's property that sunny Wednesday afternoon, we would suggest that time might have been better spent seeking gainful employment, or trying to get off of welfare, at least.

Crapnell purports to be some sort of Christian, but has apparently forgotten about John 8:7.

That's the part about "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."

Now let's let the good pastor go -- back to Ohio -- and let him sin no more.

Niagara Falls Reporter www.niagarafallsreporter.com June 21, 2011