Shotgun robberies still being probed
Suspect was shot by officer coming out of N.B. liquor store
BY JENNIFER AMATO
Staff Writer

Buy-Rite Liquors, located on Route 27 in North Brunswick, was the scene of a fatal shooting Feb. 7 as a Franklin Township police officer shot Jamar Bradley (l) who was attempting to rob the store.

Two men remained in jail Wednesday in connection with an incident in which a man suspected of robbing a North Brunswick liquor store was fatally shot by a police officer.

Jamar Bradley, 30, of New Brunswick, reportedly brandished a shotgun Feb. 7, while Joel Cruz, 26, of Somerset, removed an undetermined amount of cash from the register at Buy-Rite, Route 27, around 9:25 p.m. During the altercation, members of the Franklin Police Department entered the store and Sgt. Darrin Russo, a 22-year veteran of the department, fired a single gunshot to the chest of Bradley. Further details of the 40-second incident are still under investigation.

According to the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office, police were investigating various recent shotgun robberies in the area and were notified of a suspicious 2005 Nissan Altima, which was the car Bradley, Cruz and Joel Reyes, 28, of North Brunswick, were driving. Plainclothes officers from Franklin noticed that the vehicle had made brief stops in the parking lots of the Buy-Rite and Hidden Lake liquor stores on Route 27 and then went back to the Buy-Rite.

Cruz and Reyes were arrested and charged with possession of a shotgun for an unlawful purpose and armed robbery and were transported to the Middlesex County Adult Correction Center, where they remain awaiting $150,000 bail each. Emergency medical aid was summoned to the scene and Bradley was transported to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, according to the Prosecutor's Office, where he died at 2:45 a.m. the following morning. Preliminary results show that he died of internal injuries caused by the gunshot wound.

According to New Jersey Department of Corrections records, Bradley was sentenced on Oct. 4, 2004, to a three-year prison term for two counts of drug-related offenses. He had been out on parole since Oct. 12, 2005.

The connection of the men to any or all of the 14 other robbery incidents in Franklin, New Brunswick, Edison and South River is under investigation. Anyone with information is asked to contact Lt. Brian Caffery, Sgt. Ivan Scott or Investigator Raj Chopra of the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office at (732) 745-3300.