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Crime & Safety

Two Men Arrested After Car Chase

Police in Belleville and Nutley arrest two men while a third is still at large.

Two men have been arrested and a third is still at large after leading police on a chase in a stolen car that went from Nutley to Belleville and ended in a crash at Franklin Avenue and Liberty Street.

Devon Bailey, 19, of Bloomfield and Yusef Shark,19, of East Orange, were arrested after struggling with police in Belleville after the high-speed chase shortly after midnight Tuesday.

The incident began around 12:01 a.m. when a Nutley man told police he saw a suspicious person. A second Nutley Officer found the car at Harrison Street and Bloomfield Avenue and tried stop the car, a white Mitsubishi Galant. The occupants of the car fled and led police on a chase from Nutley into Belleville before crashing at the intersection of Franklin Avenue and Liberty Street.

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Then the people inside the car apparently fled and led police on a foot chase. A Nutley officer was assisted by a Belleville officer who was in the area. The driver was apprehended by the two officers after a struggle, and police said the man had a shotgun and a .45 caliber pistol.

A second man was also arrested after a struggle on Passaic Avenue near the rear of Belleville School No. 7, said Belleville Deputy Police Chief Mark Minichini. Minichini said the man is believed to have been in the car. A third man is believed to be at large, he said.

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Police also received a call around 12:15 a.m. from a man parking his car on Holmes Street in Belleville who said he saw two suspicious black men in black clothes on his street, one carrying a shotgun. The man parking his car said he ran away when he saw the two men in black clothes.

Later, the two men arrested were charged by Nutley Police with burglary, conspiracy to commit burglary, unlawful possession of a weapon, possession of a shotgun, unlawful possession of a handgun, resisting arrest, two counts of receiving stolen property and the driver, Bailey, was charged with eluding. In Belleville, he is charged with receiving stolen property, two counts of unlawful possession of a weapon and two counts of possession of a weapon for unlawful purposes, resisting arrest, and aggravated assault on a police officer.

Shark is charged in Belleville with receiving stolen property, unlawful possession of a weapon and possession of a weapon for unlawful purposes, resisting arrest, aggravated assault on a police officer and possession of burglary tools.

Nutley Police learned that the car’s plates were stolen from Bloomfield on May 6 and the car was carjacked out of East Orange on May 5. It was not clear if the stolen car was, in fact, the same one reported by the man who saw his daughter's car stolen. Belleville Police have also connected the two men arrested to another attempted robbery, Montaneri said.

Both suspects were charged with burglary, and conspiracy to commit burglary in Nutley in addition to the earlier charges, Montaneri and were being held in lieu of $50,000 bail each in Nutley.

Minichini said the two are also now charged with robbery in connection to the man who fled his home on Holmes Street. “We determined the two planned to try and rob (the Holmes Street man),” Minichini said.

Nutley Commissioner Alphonse Petracco, director of the Department of Public Safety, said his “first concern was for the safety of his officers,” while Police Chief John Holland commended the police and said Nutley and Belleville Police “worked well together.”

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