Witness, colleagues help Cresskill police nab suspected burglar

ANOTHER CVP SCOOP: A witness who paid attention to details, combined with the resources of several area law enforcement agencies, led to the arrest of a career criminal — already out on bail on other charges — in connection with a Cresskill home burglary last week.

Photo Credit: *Courtesy Cresskill Police Department*

Jerry DeMarco

02/27/2013 8:53 p.m.

The witness dialed 911 after seeing a burglar shoulder open the front door of a Burns Place home last Thursday.

“We just missed him,” Detective Jason Lanzilotti told CLIFFVIEW PILOT this afternoon, noting that the witness described both the bandit and a large black SUV he sped off in.

Along with evidence collected by the Bergen County Sheriff’s Bureau of Criminal Identification at the burglarized home, Cresskill detectives had enough information to share with colleagues from the Closter, Englewood, Teaneck and Northvale police departments and the county Prosecutor’s Office, he said.

Thanks to that “collective assistance,” Lanzilotti said, 26-year-old Shakir Q. Major was quickly identified as the prime suspect.

Yesterday, officers arrested Major at his Teaneck home.

“It was good work by everybody who collectively got together and moved quickly,” Lanzilotti said.

Major has been arrested for a host of offenses in Bergen County the past seven years — among them, burglary, assault and child abuse, records show.

He’d been free on bail until yesterday after Northvale police arrested him on burglary and theft charges last November.

Major was being held on $70,000 bail on the new burglary and theft charges in the Bergen County Jail.

MUGSHOT: Courtesy Cresskill Police Department

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