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Fred Dabies (STORY / PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter Mary K. Miraglia)
Brought before a judge were Jorge Valencia, the superintendent of Dabies’s St. Moritz building where the Nov. 26, 2013 robbery occurred, along with Adonis Sepulveda and Alexander Suarez.
Their attorneys all entered “not guilty” pleas for them as Dabies and others watched.
Sepulveda’s girlfriend, Ramona P. Mercado-Vasquez, is due for her arraignment March 23.
Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor David Calviello told Judge Edward A. Jerejian he is still working “very diligently” to formulate a formal plea offer.
However, he warned, “It will be at the higher end for first degree crimes — probably 15 years in state prison.”
Each man faces “solid first-degree charges” that could put them behind bars for 40 years if convicted at a trial.
All of the defense lawyers asked for more time to review voluminous evidence. Superior Court Judge Edward A. Jerejian said he’d “see what can be worked out.”
The indictment, which includes several first-degree counts, charges the quartet with:
• confining Daiies “for a substantial period to facilitate the commission of a crime or flight thereafter,” as well as inflicting “bodily injury to terrorize him,” before failing to release the well-known developer to a safe place;
• using force to injury Daiies and an employee of his, Marino Castillo, threatening to harm them while pointing a gun at them “under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to human life”;
• conspiring to commit kidnapping, armed robbery, or armed burglary;
• stealing $75,000 from him;
• hindering their apprehensions, prosecutions and convictions by concealing or destroying surveillance equipment, along with “data, clothing, burglary tools including booties, masks and gloves, and lying to law enforcement.
The indictment says the group “met, planned, discussed and agreed to participate in kidnapping, armed robbery or armed burglary.”
It also reveals for the first time that they allegedly “on more than one occasion attempted to carry out the offenses.”
Ramona Mercado Vasquez, defense attorney Ron Bar-Nadav from previous court appearance (STORY / FILE PHOTO: Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter)
The indictment says they “assisted one another in kidnapping both victims and taking property from Daibes’ apartment, and assisted each other in removing or concealing surveillance equipment and burglary implements from the crime scene.”
The crew entered Daibes’ apartment “armed with or displaying what appeared to be a handgun, and purposely inflicted bodily injury on [him],” it adds.
Sepulveda is charged separately with threatening to kill Daiies or putting him “in imminent fear of death.”
He and Mercado-Vasquez also face separate counts of handgun possession without a permit.
Suarez, meawhile, is charged separately wth hindering, by attempting “to remove proceeds from the burglary” that were in an apartment in the building shared by Mercado-Vasquez and Sepulveda and by lying to law enforcement.
He was also charged as convicted felon with illegal weapons possession, having previously been convicted of drug possession in a school zone.
Valencia is charged with eluding for fleeing to the Boston area as detectives closed in.
All four defendants remained held on $1 million bail each in the Bergen County Jail.
Federal authorities also have slapped a detainer on Valencia.
Daiies was tied up with a bag over his head so he couldn’t see what they were doing, prosecutors said. His ribs were broken and $2 million in cash, gold and jewelry was taken during what became a nearly three-hour ordeal.
At one point, the thieves lured the doorman upstairs during the robbery, then tied him up, as well, prosecutors said. Then they took the surveillance video from the doorman’s station, they said.
All of the stolen merchandise was found in the apartment at the St. Moritz building where Vasquez lived with Sepulveda, Calviello said earlier this year.
Authorities began searching for Valencia almost immediately after busting Mercado Vasquez and Sepulveda the day after the robbery. They later arrested Suarez of the Bronx, on Dec. 11, 2013.
After learning of Valencia’s whereabouts, detectives from Bergen County Prosecutor John L. Molinelli’s office alerted the Boston Police Fugitive Unit and U.S. Marshal’s Office, who took him into custody in Massachusetts on Jan. 9 of last year.
A defense attorney last year claimed that Valencia fled to the Boston area after being threatened by Daibes’s family. Valencia was willing to work with police but didn’t trust that he’d be protected, she said.
Calviello said he didn’t know of any threats. He also said that Valencia bolted from the rent-free apartment given to him by his former boss of 17 years once he knew that investigators were interested in him.
Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor David Calviello and Adonis Sepulveda, Alexander Suarez, Jorge Valencia and their attorneys (STORY / PHOTOS: CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter Mary K. Miraglia)
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