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Charges against Maksim Burakhovich include sounding a false public alarm, possession of a knife and burglary — for cutting his way into a neighboring unit where police said they found him naked and huddled in a corner the evening of June 10.
A resident of the Society Hill complex on Juniper Way told CLIFFVIEW PILOT that she and a neighbor noticed the gas mask taped to the door that morning.
My neighbor said, ‘I don’t like the looks of that’,” she said. “So she called the police.”
Maksim Burakhovich
Officers who knocked on his door at just after 8:30 a.m. that day said the 27-year-old Burakhovich partially opened it, then quickly slammed it shut and threw the dead bolt.
In addition to the gas mask, officers found a bag of bullets, a chemical engineering degree, a rifle flash suppressor attachment and the handwritten note on the door, Mahwah Police Chief James Batelli said.
“He has a long psychiatric history,” the chief said at the time. “We’ve been there many times.”
Police immediately evacuated three buildings, relocating 45 or so residents to the township Senior Center for much of the day.
Burakhovich — who claimed to be a married Mahwah High School Class of 2005 and NJIT 2011 graduate — didn’t respond after several hours of attempts to reach him “via cell phone, house phone and with a bull horn,” Batelli said.
Bomb Squad members deployed a robot that was blocked by mattresses and a TV placed in its way. When they finally went in, the officers shot pepper spray before advancing, the chief said.
They discovered that Burakhovich had climbed a dropped staircase to the attic, then cut his way through sheetrock to an adjoining attic, Batelli said.
Then they found him, draped him in a sheet and led him out.
“He offered no resistance and was taken into custody without making any statements,” Batelli said, adding that he’d apparently cut and bruised himself on his hands, back and chest climbing through the broken wall.
Batelli said his parents, who own the unit where he lived, had urged Burakhovich to seek psychological counseling after he’d stopped taking his medication. They rushed to the scene following the incident, the chief said.
Burakhovich was taken to Bergen Regional Medical Center and later released pending grand jury action.
The indictment returned two weeks ago in Hackensack also charges him with property damage and eluding police.
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