Here are the top New Jersey news stories for Thursday:

New Jersey’s largest newspaper will soon no longer be available in a print format.

The Newark Morning Ledger Co., the owner of the Star-Ledger, said it will no longer publish a print edition of the newspaper after Feb. 2. The company also plans to close its Montville production facility. The online version will continue at NJ.com.

Sister newspapers the Times of Trenton, the South Jersey Times and the weekly Hunterdon County Democrat, owned by Advance Local, will also end their print editions. All will continue to be available online.

NEW BRUNSWICK — A Rutgers University student has been accused of using his cell phone to take video of several female students while they showered at dorms on the Rutgers campus in New Brunswick.

Rutgers Police Department received a call on Oct. 2, reporting one such student being recorded while in the bathroom.

In the following weeks, police received at least two reports of similar incidents in nearby dorms.

Several New Jersey towns have set teen curfews for Halloween activities this week as a proactive measure against possible problems.

Edison, Long Branch, Perth Amboy, Voorhees, South River, Wall Township and Washington Township in Morris County have set a 9 p.m. curfew for most of the week, including Wednesday, which is known as Mischief Night. Middletown and Point Pleasant Beach have curfews starting at 8 p.m. South Plainfield and Woodbridge’s curfew takes effect at 7 p.m. Clementon’s curfew starts at 7:30 p.m.

In some of the towns, the curfews apply to those age 16 and under, while other towns impact those 18 and younger.

TRENTON — A state grand jury has voted to file charges against six state correctional police officers in connection with the alleged assault of an inmate at the Garden State Youth Correctional Facility in Burlington County, over four years ago — and an alleged coverup in officer reports.

A seven-count indictment was returned against the following sergeant and five senior corrections officers, stemming from what authorities said was a pepper spraying and forceful cell removal incident on April 8, 2020.

OCEAN TOWNSHIP (Ocean) — A New Jersey woman lied about having to help her child with cancer treatments so that she could convince a judge to repeatedly delay her case, according to authorities.

Alicia Campbell, 37, of Mays Landing was charged on Tuesday with records tampering, impersonation, forgery, obstruction of justice, and making a false statement, the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office said.

Authorities said that during an ongoing criminal case, Campbell claimed her child had leukemia and that she needed to take care of them.

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The county previously launched its “Housing Hub” in 2019 to assist residents who have emergency housing needs or are experiencing homelessness. More than 2,800 people were served by the hub in 2023. Currently, a network of agencies and providers collaborate to get people experiencing homelessness or a housing emergency temporary shelter, according to Pastor Darlene Trappier, founder and executive director of Mt. Holly-based Beacon of Hope.

“We do have contracts where we’re able to put them in motel placements,” she said. “We’re able to provide the motel placements throughout the year until cold blue season starts.”

Trappier herself experienced homelessness when she was living in Los Angeles as a 19-year-old with a 5-month-old baby. Her mother took her public assistance check and gave her a half-hour to leave the house.

“I had a choice, I either could go to the park with him … or I go down to Skid Row,” she said.

She chose to go to the park, but said she appealed to God to take her out of her situation and “put me in a position where I can help others not feel what I can feel.”

For Trappier, the new county-run shelter is “a haven of hope” that she likens to one-stop shopping because of its proximity to the county’s Human Services building, which is across the parking lot from the site of the shelter.

“They can go there to get the services that they need, and come back over here,” she added. “It’s all encompassed together to meet not just a part of one person’s needs.”

The shelter is expected to be complete in approximately 16 to 20 months. It will cost more than $18 million. Nearly $6.5 million in federal and state grants will pay for the building.

Some residents have opposed the shelter, saying it will worsen homelessness. Hopson said that the shelter will help people and give them easy access to services that will help them.

“The reality is most homeless people are the ones at risk, not our residents,” she said. “It is my hope that they will find it in their hearts to understand why this is such a need and why we’ve selected this location.”

A video highlighting the stark disconnect between the expected view and actual visibility of the northern lights in New Jersey earlier this month has received a storm of sympathy from users on TikTok.

The video was posted by a user called @nurse.dezzy and has gained over 280,000 views since it was shared on October 11.

A note overlaid on the clip says: “The photo that everyone is posting vs. what the northern lights actually looked like in NJ [New Jersey] tonight.”

The clip shows a person in a car holding up a vibrant photo of the northern lights, contrasting it against a dark, uneventful New Jersey sky outside the car window.

Residents in New Jersey as well New York were treated to a rare viewing of the northern lights earlier this month after the Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shared a post on X, formerly Twitter, for a geomagnetic storm watch for October 10 to 11.

“A CME [coronal mass ejection] will quite likely arrive at Earth and lead to highly elevated geomagnetic activity,” the SWPC said at the time.

A CME is a solar event that sees “a billion tons of plasma ejected from the sun, traveling at a million miles per hour,” explains the NOAA.

“When a CME arrives at Earth, it can produce some of the biggest geomagnetic storms and thus, some of the brightest and most active auroras that extend furthest toward the equator,” notes the NOAA.

The viral post comes in a year when northern lights chasers might be able to catch a glimpse of the natural light display from areas of the world where they’re normally not seen.

Scientists have said 2024 may see the strongest northern lights activity in the past 20 years as well as the decade to come due to high solar activity, which was projected to peak between January and October this year, the NOAA said.

The TikTok post struck a chord with several viewers, including many who experienced similar disappointments.

User @leah189546 commented: “Thank you for posting this because I felt like I was losing my mind.” Another user, @laynarachel, added “People near me are posting, and I’m like where is it?!”

Alex W Young said: “Yes. I saw all these great photos at like 10pm when I finally drove home from my show at like 2am I barely got anything on camera.”

Nicole said: “I’m also in New Jersey and my pictures look exactly the same” and Nikki wrote “I have a video showing the same.”

D.Dentz Motivation said: “I went out… I haven’t seen anything.”

Newsweek has contacted the original poster for comment via TikTok. This video has not been independently verified.

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