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(COURTESY BERGEN COUNTY PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE)
Sgt. Mike Messina, 44, “originally thought it was a man [behind the wheel], but it wasn’t,” Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this morning.
Messina was released earlier today from Valley Hospital, the prosecutor said. Officer Kenneth Cavanaugh, who was also struck, was released last night.
( SEE THE EXCLUSIVE CVP REPORT: Bogus prescription led to cop struck by car, shots fired, in safety-compromised Fair Lawn )
Priscilla Coleman, 31, was the getaway driver for 31-year-old Cyrinthia Marlin, who had gone into the Walgreens on River Road, where the incident occurred.
Molinelli confirmed an exclusive CLIFFVIEW PILOT report from last night that Marlin — who, like Coleman, is from Newark — tried unsuccessfully to fill a bogus prescription for Oxycodone. A published report today incorrectly says Marlin was shoplifting.
Fair Lawn police were called, and Messina and Cavanaugh arrived as Marlin was getting into the 2003 maroon Lexus. Cavanaugh was knocked down as he reached for the passenger door and the car backed up, Molinelli said.
The vehicle then headed straight for Messina, who managed to squeeze off two rounds from his service weapon before he was hit, the prosecutor said.
From all appearances, the shooting was apparently justified, but Molinelli said it was “premature” under state guidelines to characterize the indicent, which his office is required to review.
Thanks to specific descriptions provided by witnesses, the car was later found in Newark, the prosecutor said. After interviewing the owner, detectives arrested Martin and Coleman, he said.
Both are being held on $1 million bail, charged with attempted murder, pending a Superior Court appearance in Hackensack this afternoon.
EXCLUSIVE: Bogus prescription led to cop struck by car, shots fired, in safety-compromised Fair Lawn
Thursday, 02 September 2010 BYJerry DeMarcoONLY ON CVP: As a woman went into the Walgreens on River Road in Fair Lawn, trying to fill a phony prescription, a lookout remained outside in a black Lexus. The woman was leaving the store as police pulled up. Within moments, an officer was struck by the fleeing Lexus and at least one shot from his gun was fired at the vehicle, CLIFFVIEW PILOT has learned.
Police sources with direct knowledge of the incident told CLIFFVIEW PILOT that a manhunt was still under way as of 9:30 p.m. for the driver –who clipped the Fair Lawn sergeant just as a rally outside the Municipal Building by officers protesting a wave of layoffs in town was breaking up. CONTINUED….
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