Korean Job Discussion Forums

[wylies99]

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/home_top_stories/7145997.html

Did Corzine's driver get an e-mail?
A police officer says he sent a message confronting the trooper over an extra-marital affair just before the April 12 crash.
By Jan Hefler
Inquirer Staff Writer

New Jersey State Police are investigating an allegation that the trooper who was driving Gov. Corzine's SUV two weeks ago when it crashed going 91 m.p.h. may have been distracted by e-mails sent to his mobile phone or BlackBerry.

A Berkeley Heights police sergeant was quoted in the Star-Ledger of Newark yesterday saying he sent an e-mail shortly before the crash to Trooper Robert Rasinski, confronting him over having a two-year affair with his wife, Susan. He said he enclosed a family photo as an attachment.

Detective Sgt. Michael Mathis said he hoped the angry messages he sent to Rasinski did not cause the April 12 crash on the Garden State Parkway.

"We are confirming that there is this allegation and that it is under investigation," State Police Lt. Gerald Lewis said yesterday. He declined to comment further.

Police are trying to determine whether Rasinski saw the messages just before the crash and whether they had an effect on his state of mind. The governor's Chevrolet Suburban, speeding and with lights flashing, was struck by a pickup truck that had swerved to avoid another vehicle. The SUV then spun around and crashed into a guardrail.

Davy Jones, president of the State Troopers Fraternal Association, blasted Mathis' allegations yesterday and called them "dogpile."

"My people are out there doing the right thing," he said yesterday.

Jones told the Star-Ledger the investigators asked Rasinski "all these questions in a taped interview. That's part of the standard protocols. . . . There's nothing here other than an understandably aggrieved, soon-to-be ex-husband putting something forward that is totally without merit, and it's a sin."

The new twist in the crash investigation came as doctors reported that Corzine is breathing on his own and began taking food yesterday.

Mathis, 40, had posted messages on the Star-Ledger's Web forum, saying he had sent Rasinski the e-mail with the photo just minutes before the accident. "I hope it didn't cause the crash," Mathis wrote in the forum, "but no man in his right mind could have been thinking clearly with the affair exposed."

Mathis confirmed to the newspaper that he had posted the comments.

Mathis also wrote in the forum that he first contacted Rasinski on April 10 in a phone call and, over the next two days, exchanged text messages with the trooper. He told the newspaper he learned a month ago his wife was having an affair.

Neither Mathis nor Rasinski could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Corzine, who suffered 11 broken ribs, fractures of his breastbone, collarbone and femur, remains at Cooper University Hospital in Camden in critical but stable condition.

His doctors said yesterday they were pleased with his recovery and that he began a regular diet two days after being removed from a breathing ventilator.

"The governor continues to breathe on his own. The tube on the right side of his chest has been removed," his doctor, Steven Ross, said in a statement yesterday.

"As mentioned earlier, the governor was showing some signs of tracheo-bronchitis," Ross added. "This is being effectively treated with antibiotics. He is able to converse easily with family and staff. . . . He shows no evidence of any other complication."

Anthony Coley, Corzine's spokesman, said the governor ate mashed potatoes with gravy, chatted with relatives and his girlfriend, and watched part of a Jersey Devils game on television.

Coley said Corzine had not yet spoken to investigators about the crash.

"I suspect that his doctors will have more to say about his memory of what happened in the days ahead," Coley said.

As for Mathis' allegations, Coley said: "Trooper Rasinski has been a respected and professional member of the governor's Executive Protection Unit. We're not familiar enough with these accusations to comment."




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contact staff writer Jan Hefler at 856-779-3224 or [email protected]

[Ya-ta Boy]

What's up with New Jersey governors lately? Didn't one just get booted for having a boyfriend or something?