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Welfare State Policies Result In Stupid Crime For Us To Laugh At

By Mike Hudson

It’s bad enough that councilman-turned-Mayor Paul Dyster’s decade of public service to

Niagara Falls has resulted in half the town being on public assistance, but it’s completely unacceptable that people who aren’t even qualified for welfare are collecting benefits fraudulently.

City police have been cracking down on welfare cheats in recent weeks, and last Friday they hauled in two couples who’d been living the Life of Reilly dishonestly, using your tax dollars.

On Friday afternoon, officers responded to 2061 Tennessee Ave., where George Connelly, 36, and Tabitha Bobie, 30, were presumably playing Xbox on their 40-inch flat screen TV. Each was charged with grand larceny, welfare fraud and offering a false instrument, which is when you submit a sworn document to a government agency that you know contains false or misleading information.

While getting a job apparently seems like a quaint and novel idea to many here in the falls, we’re here to tell you it beats getting arrested and going to jail by a country mile.

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Tenant Fight Leads to Melee on Cleveland Ave.

Looking at the police news over the past week, it appears that a lot of people who apparently have a lot of time on their hands spend a lot of that time committing acts of criminal mischief and assaulting one and other.

Cleveland Ave. is a lousy place to live, dangerous and full of violent crime despite its close proximity to Mayor Dyster’s poorly named and insanely expensive "Public Safety Building."

Fortunately, cops didn’t have far to drive last week when they responded to a complaint at 2749 Cleveland Ave. about an assault.

When they arrived on the scene there were a number of people milling about, watching the commotion that led to one guy being wounded in the hand and other guy running around with his shirt off like he’d just been in an altercation.

Turns out cops were dealing with a classic tenant dispute, in which an unnamed individual accused a guy named Michael Hamilton of turning off the electricity to his girlfriend’s apartment. Both Hamilton and Jenna Simone, the comely girlfriend, live at the Cleveland Ave. address.

Long story short, somebody pulled a knife, somebody else produced an aluminum baseball bat and a melee ensued.

Bravely, the comely Simone - who told cops she’s two months pregnant - attempted to intervene between the two men and was clobbered by the baseball bat for her trouble.

In the classic Niagara Falls tradition, witnesses were largely uncooperative, refusing to give cops their names, addresses or places of employment -- just joking there! - but they all agreed it was Hamilton, who ended up getting arrested on assault charges, who was the aggressor.

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Burglaries Help Boost Welfare Income

Oftentimes, our welfare recipients feel the need to augment the meager public assistance handout they receive by actually going out and earning some real money. Obviously they can’t do this by getting a real job, since that income would be reported and they’d lose their welfare benefits.

While drug dealing and prostitution are the most popular avenues for picking up some extra cash, burglary is on the rise and has become more important than Rent-A-Center in accounting for the large number of large screen television sets found in the homes of our poverty stricken and dispossessed welfare community.

Last week, officers were dispatched to a Ferry Avenue address, where a couple said their apartment door had been kicked in and property valued at $4,300 had been made off with in their absence.

The swag included a dining room set, a bedroom set, a refrigerator, an oven, some antique mirrors and a surround sound stereo system.

A neighbor told cops she saw two black males taking the stuff out and loading it into a late model Chevy Silverado.

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Armed Robbery Popular Pastime

Armed robbery is another popular Niagara Falls pastime. And the 1300 block of 24th St. is just the place to engage in it.

One night last week, shortly after 11 o’clock, a fella was walking south on 24th St. when he noticed three black males walking north on the opposite side. They were young and wearing hoodies, he said. When they crossed the street he knew he was in for it.

When they confronted him, one pulled a little nickel plated pistol of the sort often seen in welfare, ghetto-related crime. They demanded the guy’s money. He gave them what he had, a twenty, a five and four ones. Then they wanted his phone but he didn’t have one.

He thanked his lucky stars they didn’t shoot him.

Cops said the trio was last seen walking down the alley between Pierce and Whitney. Officers attempted to locate them but without any luck.

The punks were lucky the guy didn’t have a gun himself. It was only a couple of years ago that a pizza deliveryman clipped a Niagara Falls High School student at the same location when they tried to rob him with a BB gun.

He couldn’t tell it wasn’t real.

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Welfare State Seen as Failure

There was always poverty and crime, but it was never as bad as it became following Lyndon Baines Johnson’s introduction of the "Great Society" in the middle 1960s that introduced the welfare state as we know it today.

Generational welfare recipients, living in public housing, never knowing the dignity of work and as familiar with the criminal justice system as many are with the system of higher education, live lives of not so quiet desperation and represent a burden to people who could better spend their money taking care of their own families.

After nearly a half century it is clear that the welfare state has been a complete and utter failure. Those who continue to champion it are those who do not have to live with its’ everyday consequences.

Maybe someday, the government will wake up. Until then, we’ll continue to provide you with details on the antics our hapless wards engage in, just for laughs.

 

 

Niagara Falls Reporter - Publisher Frank Parlato Jr. www.niagarafallsreporter.com

SEP 24, 2013