Attorney Kenyatta Stewart Discusses Paterson Truce
Paterson’s generations old turf war has taken a terrible toll. Last summer 12-year-old Genesis Rincon was shot and killed while riding her scooter. Last month 15-year-old Armoni Sexton — who could have been the next LeBron James — was shot and killed on the corner. Now there’s a truce brokered by a local attorney who’s earned the trust of both factions — up the hill and down the hill. Attorney Kenyatta Stewart sat down with NJTV News Correspondent David Cruz to discuss what’s going on in the city.
Stewart said the divide between the First and Fourth Wards, dubbed up the hill and down the hill, is real but it doesn’t necessarily have to do with gangs. “It’s if you live on one side of town, you’re from up the hill. If you live on the opposite side of town, you’re from down the hill,” he said. “Doesn’t mean you’re involved in anything, however there were pockets of people from up the hill and down the hill who had a problem with each other that resulted in the truce.”
In addition to being a lawyer with offices in Newark and Paterson, Stewart is a community activist. “You have to use what you have, the influence that you have on people to get people to do what you need to happen. And that’s part of the reason why I had to put together the truce, myself and other people in the community,” he said.
Stewart grew up in Paterson and said he was part of the up the hill, down the hill divide. But since that was during the 1990s, he said the conflicts were resolved differently. He said, “We’d fight it out.” Today, conflicts often lead to gunfire.
“Even during the truce, at one point there was a discussion on, ‘You know what? If you have such a hard problem or a problem with the fact that I’ve done something to you, then why don’t we fight it out?’ One of the guys said, ‘Listen, if we’re gonna fight it out, we might as well shoot it out,'” Stewart said.
Stewart said he wasn’t the only person involved in brokering the truce. There were a number of community activists that participated. He said as a lawyer, the people involved trust him. “If I tell these guys, ‘Listen I want you guys to meet at my office and no police officers are gonna be there and no one’s going to be recording it,’ well they can trust me,” he said.
Community activists and the police in Paterson are working to make relations better. Stewart said there will be a block party tomorrow involving members of the police and fire departments and celebrating three weeks of the truce. At the block party, every person who gets a beverage will receive it from a police officer.
“We’re gonna have the police officers stationed in the area so if you want water, you want juice, you want anything else, you have to get it though the police. That’s a different type of community policing,” Stewart said.