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Daniel McKay, 53, of Fair Lawn also was being eyed as the possible big-nosed burglar who broke into the same Krauzers in Saddle Brook two different times in the past month.
Fair Lawn Police Officer Nicholas Snyder was on patrol near the Elmwood Park border when he heard a loud bang at All Star Wine & Liquor on Broadway at East 54th Street around 3:30 a.m. and spotted McKay trying to kick out the front door glass, authorities told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this morning.
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 Fair Lawn Officer Anthony Lugo, Lt. James Corcoran said.
McKay, of Chandler Drive, was in the Elmwood Park lockup pending transfer to the Bergen County Jail, where a judge ordered him held on $10,000 bail, Elmwood Park Police Chief Michael Foligno said.
Meanwhile, his detectives were reaching out to Glen Rock and Saddle Brook police, the chief said.
Around midnight, hours before the Elmwood Park burglary, 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, Ridgewood and a Bergen County Sheriff’s K-9 participated in the search, which went into Fair Lawn, before the bandit vanished.
Saddle Brook Police Chief Robert Kugler 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).
Just after midnight on June 15, the thief threw a concrete block through the front glass door of the Market Street convenience store, 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….
Corcoran, the Fair Lawn lieutenant, said detectives in his department were exploring whether McKay was responsible for a burglary last month at the Green Dragon restaurant on Fair Lawn Avenue.
SURVEILLANCE IMAGE: Courtesy SADDLE BROOK PD
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