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Uber driver Karina Eremyan, 30, of Fair Lawn was behind the wheel when ex-con Antonio Bowen, 28, of Fair Lawn put a knife to the passenger’s neck in the parking lot of the Crowne Plaza Saddle Brook hotel off Route 80 around 3:30 a.m. March 23, Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella said.
Bowen forced the fare to turn over his backpack, which contained $3,000 and other undisclosed items, the prosecutor said Friday.
The victim then ran off, Musella said.
Bowen, meanwhile, fled in a vehicle driven by Allen Ernst, 28, of Garfield, he said.
Things seemed a little fishy right from the start, authorities said.
Detectives from the prosecutor’s Special Investigations Squad and the Saddle Brook Police Department quietly investigated the robbery over the next several months without publicly revealing any details.
Eventually, the pieces came together.
Bowen has been arrested nearly a dozen times over the past decade, mostly on drug charges, but also for burglary, theft, hindering, identity theft and falsely incriminating someone.
Fair Lawn police seized Bowen following a chase on March 10 only to see him released from the Bergen County Jail by a judge in Hackensack the next day.
The Uber robbery in Saddle Brook was committed less than two weeks later, Musella said.
Rochelle Park police earlier this month arrested Bowen on drug, hindering and receiving stolen property charges. He was first sent to the Bergen jail and then handed over the next day on a warrant to authorities from Morris County, where he has remained held on charges that couldn’t immediately be determined.
Eremyan was arrested without incident in Hasbrouck Heights on Aug. 18, Musella said.
Ernst, meanwhile, was arrested without incident in Saddle Brook this past Monday, he said.
Bowen was served with his charges at the Morris County Correctional Facility later that same afternoon, the prosecutor said.
Eremyan and Ernst have remained held in the Bergen County Jail pending further court action. All three are charged with first-degree armed robbery, as well as conspiracy and weapons offenses.
Musella thanked Saddle Brook and Hasbrouck Heights police and the Bergen County Sheriff’s Office for their assistance.
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