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Defense attorney Adam Lustberg (above, left) told Presiding Superior Court Judge Liliana DeAvila-Silebi that he needed more time to review the evidence before he could negotiate a deal for 22-year-old Byron Sankar (right) in the Aug. 3, 2013 shooting death of Alex Bridge.
Nicholas Questal (FILE PHOTO: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter)
Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor Danielle Grootenboer agreed to a June 8 cutoff, noting that Sankar’s case wasn’t tied to those of two co-defendants.
One of them, 25-year old Aaron McMorris of Hackensack, fled along with Sankar but returned to the scene and called police to try and get help for their friend, authorities said.
McMorris has been offered probation if he will plead guilty to giving false information to police. He remained free on $75,000 bail.
Nicholas Questal, 24, a native of Trinidad and Tobago who was also living in East Orange, is charged with giving or selling Sankar the gun that killed Bridge. He was in federal custody following a drug conviction and could be deported, authorities said.
Bridge was partying with Sankar, Sankar’s wife and McMorris outside the rear of the Brookchester Apartments when Sankar pulled out the .9mm handgun to show the others, Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli said at the time.
Aaron McMorris (FILE PHOTO: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter Mary K. Miraglia)
Sankar “handled the weapon in such a reckless manner that it discharged, striking the victim in the abdomen and resulting in his death,” the prosecutor said.
Bridge, who lived on Monmouth Avenue and worked at Norstrom, was taken to Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck after being struck once in the abdomen with the high-caliber bullet, law enforcement sources told CLIFFVIEW PILOT moments after the his body was found in the parking lot of the nearby New Milford Estates housing complex on Reichelt Road.
He died at the hospital, they said.
The gun was never recovered.
Sankar remained held today on $450,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail, down from an original $1 million, on charges of first-degree aggravated manslaughter, endangering an incapacitated victim, two counts of hindering and one of illegal handgun possession.
STORY / PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter Mary K. Miraglia
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