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A composite sketch led to the identification of Anyelo A. Mejia, 37, after two girls told police he twice offered them a ride home as they passed his white newer-model Honda Accord, which was parked on West Pleasant Avenue near Lincoln Avenue, around 8:45 p.m. Sunday, Police Chief David Pegg told Daily Voice.
The first time, the girls told police, they ran in the opposite direction.
A few minutes later, they said, he pulled up to them on West Pleasant Avenue and "asked for their telephone numbers and asked why they were afraid of him," Pegg said.
A witness provided a partial license plate.
Detective Michael Parodi also obtained images of the car from video surveillance cameras at West Pleasant Avenue businesses and saw a distinct sticker on the vehicle’s windshield, Pegg said.
Parodi then worked with the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission to identify the vehicle.
Combined with a NJ State Police artist sketch and the partial plate, it helped identify Mejia, whose car has the same sticker, the chief said.
Early Monday, police found Mejia. He was interviewed and arrested on two counts of luring a child.
He was then released without bail pending a detention hearing in Central Judicial Processing Court in Hackensack, under New Jersey's 2017 bail reform law.
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