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Daniel McKay, of Chandler Drive in Fair Lawn, was also charged by Glen Rock police for a break-in at the Krauszers in their town just hours before yesterday’s Elmwood Park burglary.
The combined bail had reached $70,000 for McKay, who was being held in the Bergen County Jail on charges out of the three towns — with additional counts possible from Fair Lawn police if they tie him to a burglary last month at the Green Dragon restaurant on Fair Lawn Avenue.
All told, McKay faces five counts of burglary, three of theft and one each of criminal attempt and resisting arrest.
Fair Lawn Police Officer Nicholas Snyder was on patrol near the Elmwood Park border around 3:30 a.m. yesterday when he heard a loud bang at All Star Wine & Liquor on Broadway at East 54th Street and spotted McKay trying to kick out the front door glass, Elmwood Park Police Chief Michael Foligno told CLIFFVIEW PILOT.
McKay — whose petty criminal history stretches back two decades — ran up the hill to the railroad tracks into Fair Lawn and was grabbed a short time later by fellow Officer Anthony Lugo, Fair Lawn Lt. James Corcoran said.
A few hours earlier, Glen Rock police got a call from an alarm company and chased a man who’d broken into a Krauszers on Prospect Street.
He fit McKay’s general description, Foligno said.
Fair Lawn and Ridgewood police and a Bergen County Sheriff’s K-9 unit participated in the search, which went into Fair Lawn with negative results.
Kugler, the Saddle Brook chief, told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this morning that his investigators were exploring whether McKay was the burglar who smashed his way into a local Krauszers twice in less than three weeks, taking cash and Newports (surveillance photo, above).
The thief threw a concrete block through the front glass door of the Market Street convenience store just after midnight on June 15, then grabbed the cash register and several cartons of cigarettes and ran out to a dark-colored vehicle.
He then went back inside and filled a medium-sized trash can from behind the counter with additional cigarettes, rolled coins and other items.
The burglar returned at 5:15 a.m. on July 5 and smashed the same door with a brick before climbing through and taking cartons of Newports and cash.
Police described him as white, about 5-foot-10 to 6 feet tall, with dark hair and a “larger than average” nose. READ MORE….
MUGSHOT / SURVEILLANCE IMAGE: Courtesy SADDLE BROOK PD
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