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Officers Angelo Calabro and Mathew Baskinger stopped a silver Mercedes Benz E-Class with an obstructed windshield at Washington Avenue and Ellison Street shortly after 3:30 a.m. Wednesday, Sheriff Richard H. Berdnik said.
Rear passenger Mark Jackson, 27, who was holding an open bottle of Hennessey cognac made a “quick hand movement near his pants pocket,” Berdnik said.
Suspecting he might be armed, Calabro ordered Jackson out of the car, the sheriff said.
Sure enough, Jackson was carrying a Smith & Wesson .38 Special CTG Revolver, loaded with six hollow-point bullets in his right pant pocket, Bernik said.
Officers also ordered the front-seat passenger, 28-year-old ex-con Messiah Bronson out of the car, as well, he said.
“I got something on me, it's in my right pocket,” Bronson told them, the sheriff said.
Baskinger recovered a defaced and loaded Smith & Wesson "Bodyguard" .380-caliber semiautomatic handgun, he said.
The gun was submitted for tracing, Berdnik said.
Both men were charged with weapons offenses, including against Bronson for being a convicted felon caught with a firearm.
They were sent to the Passaic County Jail to await first appearances in Central Judicial Processing Court in Paterson.
The driver, identified as Lauren Kirk, 31, received a summons and was released, the sheriff said.
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