Hello? Anyone home?

You have to wonder if the people in the Englishtown Police Department really know what's going on in the borough.

On Jan. 11 a person informed the News Transcript newsroom that they had seen an accident in Englishtown in which a telephone pole had fallen through a car.

As far as we can tell, that is not the type of motor vehicle accident that occurs in Englishtown every day.

Given that eyewitness account from a person who saw the wreck, a reporter immediately called the police department to inquire about the accident and was told - several times by police personnel over the next few days as it turned out - that no such accident had occurred; that no record of such an accident could be found; and that the accident must have occurred in Manalapan, which surrounds Englishtown.

We chalked up the episode to a confused eyewitness and forgot about it.

Now, imagine our surprise on the morning of Jan. 18 when a press release arrived via fax from the Englishtown police with eight items listed for the Police Beat column. One of those items was the following:

One minor injury was reported following a motor vehicle accident on Harrison Avenue on Jan. 11. Police said a vehicle left the road and struck a telephone pole, causing the pole to break at the base.

The pole, holding three transformers, came down on the vehicle and the vehicle ignited. Police cordoned off the block and evacuated a home that had exposure.

The Englishtown Fire Department extinguished the fire. Power and phone service was completely restored by the morning of Jan. 12, according to police.

The eyewitness, it turns out, saw what he said he did.

We'd like to know why that information was not provided by police when a reporter asked a question about the accident the same day it occurred and in the days that followed.

It is more than a little frustrating trying to report news in a timely fashion - a story we could have published in the Jan. 17 edition, given the eyewitness information we had on Jan. 11 - but instead be told that no such accident could be found.

Sometimes you just have to shake your head and wonder what's going on.