The Bronx Ink

Nat Irving committed to Virginia in July but finally signed a letter of intent last week in a small ceremony at his high school. (NY Daily News)

The University of Notre Dame came out swinging Saturday, beating Army 27 to 3 during the first football game at the new Yankee Stadium. (NY1)

Former boxing champ Iran Barkley lost it all and starting over is not easy for the Morris HS dropout. (NY Post)

Dozens of people rallied in the Bronx to stop hate crimes and marched 2.5 miles to Osborne Place, where three men were viciously attacked for being gay. (CBS)

Two of the four teens cleared of charges in the October anti-gay crime spoke to the BronxInk.

Brian Cepeda and Steven Caraballo found refuge inside their apartment building after being released from jail. Photo by Irasema Romero

The two Morris Heights teenagers had been free from jail for two days, cleared of all charges against them in a brutal, anti-gay attack in early October against three Bronx men. The city had released Brian Cepeda, 16, and Steven Caraballo, 17, along with two others for lack of evidence.

Still, they flanked opposite walls of the second-floor hallway inside a Morris Heights apartment, reluctant to leave the refuge of their building that October 28 afternoon.

More than two weeks earlier on October 9, the two had stood accused along with seven other Bronx young men of such a heinous crime, the police called them “predators,” part of a “wolf pack,” a gang called the Latin King Goonies. Prosecutors charged all of them with robbery, gang assault and unlawful imprisonment as a hate crime, which carried stiffer penalties.

The world outside still felt hostile to the boys. They were free but not free.

“Outside we are in danger,” Cepeda said. “People outside think we were the ones who did those things, but it truly wasn’t us.”

The teens knew their lives would be forever altered, still subject to the suspicions of those who didn’t believe in their innocence, and to possible threats from rival gangs who may believe they were part of the Goonies gang. Caraballo said they want a chance to live a “normal life” by clearing their names.

“I would like to tell them to put up a public notice that we are innocent,” Cepeda said in Spanish, referring to the New York Police Department. “On the streets, people think we are involved with that gang.”

Caraballo, originally from Puerto Rico, said that before he was arrested from his home he had not heard about the neighborhood gang.

“I don’t go around asking, ‘What gang are you with?’” added Cepeda, who emigrated from the Dominican Republic two and a half years ago.

Caraballo’s lawyer said the only way to clear their names would be if the police commissioner and mayor issued a public apology.

“The assistant district attorney evaluated all of the evidence, and as she said, there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him with those horrible crimes,” said defense attorney Paul Horowitz. “She did the right thing by releasing him.”

Police claimed that on the early morning of Sunday, October 3, a 17-year-old boy was beaten and sodomized with a wooden stick in an apartment at 1910 Osborne Place. Later that night, another 17-year-old boy was also beaten and forced to participate in brutalizing a 30-year-old man. The two teens were targeted by the gang for allegedly having sexual relations with the 30-year-old who was known in the neighborhood to be gay. The older man was lured to the apartment at about 8:30 p.m. for what he believed would be a party.

Caraballo and Cepeda told the Bronx Ink.org they were invited to the party as well that Sunday. When they arrived at Osborne Place around 8 p.m., several men pushed them into a separate room along with Denis Peitars, 17 and Bryan Almonte, 16 – all four were the youngest men at the party, all four were eventually cleared of charges.

The boys knew some of the men from other neighborhood parties, but according to Cepeda, the two groups were never really friends. He said they heard men outside the room talking about what they were going to do to the victims, but didn’t think they were serious.

“They put us in there, and they didn’t tell us anything of what was happening,” said Caraballo, claiming that they were also victims. “I thought it was all just joking around.”

Caraballo said all four boys were let out of the room by the older men at around 9:30 p.m. and told to go home.

At a later interview in Caraballo’s apartment, his mother, Mary Kramer, said the gang’s alleged ringleader held a gun to her son’s head and forced him to hit one of the 17-year-olds. According to court documents, Caraballo hit the young man in the face with a closed fist.

“How the hell are they going to say Steven Caraballo is a monster?” said Kramer, who added that the police said her son was being taken in only for questioning on the day he was arrested.  “What about the others?”

Cepeda said he believed they were arrested because people in the neighborhood saw them go into the house for what they thought was a party. Caraballo said the teens couldn’t do anything to stop the assaults once they left.

Kramer said her son did not see the sexual acts committed against the two men who were sodomized.

The Bronx district attorney’s office declined to comment on details of Caraballo’s release because the case is still pending against the other seven men involved. Two more Bronx men were arrested after the initial arrests on Oct. 9. “After a thorough investigation, there was not sufficient evidence to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt,” said Theresa Gottlieb, Assistant District Attorney.

Now, Caraballo and Cepeda want nothing more than to return to their lives without being linked to such crimes, or becoming part of a gang war.

“I know my mom will die if something happens to me,” said Cepeda.

His mom, Ada, said she lost 12 pounds in the three weeks her son was in jail. When The Bronx Ink visited Cepeda’s son for a follow up interview on Saturday, Oct. 30, she did not want to rehash the past month, nor did she want her son to say anymore. Holding the door halfway open a little after 1 p.m., she said Brian was sleeping.

Cepeda was now traumatized, she said, adding that she wanted to take him to a psychologist because no one should have to go to jail if they are innocent.

Caraballo and Cepeda do have a small support group in their neighborhood.

On Oct. 28, five residents climbing up and down the stairs in their Morris Heights apartment welcomed them back.

The aunt of another suspect who was recently released stopped to hug both men.

“Sometimes things you don’t want happen,” said Rosa Hernandez, Bryan Almonte’s aunt. She advised the boys to rely on God to move forward.

“This is the first and last time,” Cepeda confidently assured her.

The 10th grader at Bronx International High School was supposed to return to school the next Monday. His mother, who works as a hotel housekeeper, said Cepeda needs to regain his routine for the sake of his 12-year-old sister, who does not know her brother was in jail.

Even after returning to school, finding common ground with other students will be difficult for Cepeda. He said his true friends are in the Dominican Republic.

Before joining his mother in the Bronx, he lived with his father who works as a tailor in Santo Domingo. Although Cepeda visited him last summer, his father’s advice resonates after his experience in a small jail cell eating “bread and sugar.”

“I shouldn’t forget that in education there is a future for everyone,” Cepeda said of his father’s words, and added he now understands.

He has learned key life lessons from this experience, he said leaning on the wall with his hands down in front of him.

“A friend is one that makes you cry, not one that makes you laugh,” Cepeda said reflecting on his choice of friends. “Because there are friends that make you laugh for bad reasons, and there are friends that make you cry because they tell you the truth.”

On that Thursday afternoon, Caraballo, the quieter one of the two, agreed with Cepeda that good friends are hard to find.

He too has choices to make about his future. His father, Jose Caraballo, said some have advised him to take his 17-year-old son out of New York City, because “he said this is an ugly case.”

“We’ve got to see how the situation is going to go,” said Caraballo’s mother about the outcome of the charges held against the seven other men. “If they get out most likely I’m going to send him somewhere else. I’m not going to have him here with them.”

Caraballo said he is waiting for things to clear before sending his son back to complete a GED program. His son wants to become a motorcycle mechanic, something he dabbled in before he and the rest of his family joined his father in the Bronx.

“I know a lot, but I want to continue learning more,” Caraballo said that Thursday afternoon of his plans to go to trade school after completing the GED program.

Caraballo said he has until February to get a job and an apartment. That is because his 15-year-old girlfriend, Genesis, is six months pregnant and expecting a boy.  The “G” tattooed between his thumb and index finger is for her. Caraballo wants to make sure he gives his son the life his own parents wanted for him. His family moved from Caguas, Puerto Rico in search of more opportunities, and now his father is the superintendent of the gated building where he lives.

Caraballo said he knows his parents were right about not going out too much. One party turned out to be one too many.

Additional reporting by Amara Grautski.

Miguelina Moscoso's famous pastelito food stand is a fixture of West 234th St. in Kingsbridge. Photo by Irasema Romero

A regular workday for Miguelina Moscoso begins at 3:30 a.m. in her small two-bedroom apartment on Bailey Avenue in the Bronx.

While her three children sleep, the 46-year-old Dominican mother quietly begins her routine, preparing and frying 140 Dominican pastelitos, cooking a batch of sweet arroz con leche, and squeezing lemons for lemonade.

Depending on the day, Moscoso’s pastelitos may be filled with ground beef, shredded seasoned chicken, or scrambled eggs with melted cheese. She wraps the crispy pastries in foil to keep them warm before placing them inside her styrofoam cooler.

By 9:45 a.m., Moscoso pushes her shopping cart out the door. Her hair pulled into a low ponytail and covered with a black cap, she walks uphill to her vending location on West 234th Street. A small, collapsed table and the cooler are secured inside the cart, while bottles of lemonade and iced tea hang loosely from strings on the sides.

When she reaches the light pole in front of the Unique Thrift Store, a handful of clients begin to shell out $1 apiece for egg and cheese pastelitos.

“One of the things that motivates me the most is that people like what I do,” Moscoso said in Spanish. She makes a conscious effort to keep costs down in order to keep a loyal clientele who may patronize her restaurant one day. “My biggest hope is to have my own place, like Mexicans who have their own stores and sell their tacos; I would like that.”

Two years ago, Moscoso was not quite so optimistic about her economic future.

A week before Thanksgiving 2008, she lost her job in Albasini, a Bronx chocolate factory that had been struggling financially. She was working as a temporary factory worker cleaning big chocolate mixers.

She tried to make ends meet by working temporary jobs in various factories around the city.  After six months, she decided she wanted the flexibility of having her own mobile food stand. As a single mother with no relatives or close friends in New York City, Moscoso said she needed work that kept her near her children, Dioneli, 13, Michael, 16, and Carlos, 25, who also lives at home.

Moscoso decided to renew the mobile food vendor license she obtained in 1999 from the New York City Department of Mental Health and Hygiene, an investment of $50 every two years. Her license renewal was approved in June 2009, and soon thereafter she started loading up her shopping cart with cooking from her kitchen.

Moscoso sells her $1 pastelitos in a variety of flavors, straight from her cooler. Photo by Irasema Romero

One year later, Moscoso is still waiting to obtain a “unit” permit that would allow her to prepare pastelitos on a mobile food cart on the street. The waiting list is so long for so few licenses that it could take two to three years. The chosen few food vendors are then given six months to purchase the cart and get it inspected. In 2008 Moscoso won this lottery, but her $5,000 small business loan to buy the cart was approved with only a few days to spare, and she missed the inspection deadline.

The first time Moscoso pushed her shopping cart down West 234^th St., a group of Thrift Store employees invited her to stop by everyday to sell them pastelitos during their work breaks.

“To this day, I say that thanks to them I’m selling here,” Moscoso said.

From then on, customers arbitrarily take turns using the folding chair Moscoso brings for herself. The big hot sauce bottle is conveniently placed on the table next to them, and before taking the first bite they pour its spicy contents over their favorite pastelito.

For Jonathan Cartagena, who has worked at the store for eight months, it’s all about the egg and bacon pastelitos.

“She doesn’t make them daily, but when we ask her about it a lot, she brings them,” Cartagena said of his favorite pastelito, which Moscoso offers only a couple of days a week. “Eggs are a bit expensive and the bacon is especially expensive, so it’s hard for her.”

Although Moscoso makes the rare exception of offering pastelitos filled with costly ingredients like shrimp and bacon, she also chooses longer trips to a store that provides more affordable prices. The goal is to keep the pastelitos to one dollar apiece to continue attracting new customers.

Around 3:30 p.m., Moscoso pushes her cart home,  and then climbs back out to the No. 1 train heading to Manhattan’s Mi País Supermarket on 181^st and St. Nicholas. Instead of buying the 10-piece package of frozen empanada dough for $1.99 in the Bronx, she gets the same product for $1.29 at this Latin American grocery store. Other ingredients are also sold at a lower price in Mi País, and Moscoso does not mind making the trip if it means cutting costs.

On an average week, Moscoso brings in approximately $650, of which half is profit, after subtracting the cost of ingredients, plastic ware, ice for drinks and transportation.

With an average net income of $1,300 a month, she covers her $348 rent, which is subsidized by the New York City Housing Authority, and household expenses for the family.

Moscoso said, with hesitation, that she also has dreams of owning a house one day.

“I know maybe what I make is too little, but there is a saying, ‘no wait is too long for happiness,” she said.

This saying is what keeps her going even after almost 20 years of leaving Dominican Republic with her then first husband. Her daughter Dioneli said her mom often mentions returning to her native country, but she does not want to think about it today. When she talks about her family in Santo Domingo, her eyes water. She recently lost an uncle in the Dominican Republic but was not able to go back home for his funeral. She misses her father, she said.

Moscoso hopes her children will have an easier life than she. She is frustrated that she can not offer them more.

“If they would help me, I would make more,” she said, because her pastelitos sell out by 2 p.m. most days. “At times we argue because I am alone for everything. I tell them to help me squeeze the lemons. I could make more.”

On holidays, Moscoso adjusts her routine to make double the batch of pastelitos.

For Norma Ahmed, who lives near the Grand Concourse, Moscoso’s reputation precedes her. A friend told her to go to the store early to experience the pastelitos as part of her trip out.

“I was surprised when I come that day and saw her there,” Ahmed said of the first time she stopped at Moscoso’s food stand.

Ahmed was instantly curious about the pastelitos, and Moscoso humbly talked about her routine as she served other customers.

“As a woman, I hope she goes on to put her little own restaurant or maybe a store front,” Ahmed said. “Who knows where we’ll see Miguelina 5, 10 years from today.”

Ricardo Hernandez offers a calaverita to the Cuban salsa singer Celia Cruz. Photo by Irasema Romero

After Halloween this Sunday, Mexicans in the Bronx will cast aside their costumes to celebrate Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), a traditional Mexican holiday to commemorate friends and family members who have passed away.

Tradition holds that living family members build altares (altars) decorated with objects and food that were significant to the relative or friend who has passed on. Sugar skulls and marigolds often accompany the altars.

As part of the celebration, families also visit a person’s grave and share calaveritas, poems that use humor, irony and satire to praise the lives of the dead and remind the living of their own mortality.

Recently, El Museo del Barrio hosted a special Día de los Muertos Walking Tour at the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. The tour included the graves of famous Latinos, such as Cuban rumbera Celia Cruz who passed away in 2007. At the stoop of her mausoleum, Brooklyn-based musician and poet, Ricardo Hernandez, offered a calaverita to the talented salsa singer.

Hernandez’ calaverita told the story of Death, who was feeling sorrowful and wanted some excitement in his underworld life. All of the sudden, he hears a sweet voice utter a joyous sound. “Azucaaaar!,” Celia’s immortalized trademark shout of “Sugar!”

“Neither late nor slothful, Death sent for Celia so the infraworld could also enjoy,” Hernandez said in his musical calaverita. “Celia always helped the living, and when she arrived and saw so many dead, with a great smile this Cuban said to them, ‘why not?’”

Fun Fitness Day will be held at the M.S. 45 Don Serpone schoolyard. Photo: Irasema Romero

Military veterans will lead Belmont children in a series of interactive games during Fitness Fun Day Oct. 16 from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. at M.S. 45.

According to the New York City Department of Health, 40 percent of city children are overweight or obese. Fitness Fun Day is designed to promote more physical activity by students from kindergarten through 12th grade. The free program is sponsored by USA Fitness Corps, a non-profit organization established in 2009 to fight childhood obesity with veteran volunteers. “We want them to be as much like Saturday morning, and less like school,” said USA Fitness Corp spokesman Arthur Pincus.

Fitness Fun Day uses a custom curriculum designed by Dr. Jaci VanHeest, a professor of kinesiology and child psychology at the University of Connecticut. With names like Wicked Ball, Attack the Snack, and In the Pickle, each activity offers an opportunity for students to have fun while being physically active.

For Attack the Snack, the captain selects a food product, and along with his or her team, decides what physical activity is necessary to burn calories consumed in each serving. Depending on the calorie amount, the group collaborates to burn calories with jumping jacks, jogging or push-ups.

During training last week, participating veterans were advised not to use the word exercise with students because that makes it sound too much like work. “If they are fun, they will want to do more of those kinds of activities,” said David Haney, USA Fitness executive director. “All of that leads to a healthier and happier kid, and happier families.”

Parents may still register their children for free at the site. The school is located at 2502 Lorillard Place. For more information,  email info@usafitnesscorps.org.