July 8
...serving up your daily dish.
From the Star Ledger, a Bloomfield officer known for his gambling habit has now been charged with doing double duty as a bookie:
FBI agents and state troopers on Thursday arrested a Bloomfield police officer on charges he operated an illegal sports gambling business. The officer, William Abendschoen Sr., collected debts while on duty in uniform and a wiretap revealed that he took bets by phone, according to a federal complaint filed by the FBI.
Abendschoen's lawyer, Timothy M. Donohue, said his client did have a gambling problem. "However," said Donohue, "he was never part of any gambling business. He was nothing more than a gambler, and there's no crime in that." He said Abendschoen attended Gambler's Anonymous meetings and that his performance as an officer has not been questioned.
Meanwhile, an embezzling former Bloomfield Township employee who pilfered close to a half million from a prescription drug reimbursement program was sentenced to five years yesterday
Joanne Tricarico, 56, pleaded guilty to second-degree counts of theft by deception and official misconduct in May, acknowledging that for seven years she had stolen the money from the township's insurance fund.
The missing money, $482,578.82, was discovered during an audit of the reimbursement program, which allowed the township's 440 employees to get advance re-payment of their prescription costs.
