Officer Michael Carrino found two young men and a young woman running from the Little Red Schoolhouse Museum on Riverside Avenue while responding to a burglar alarm shortly before 7:20 p.m. Sunday, March 31, Detective Lt. Vincent Auteri said.
Carrino immediately identified himself as a police officer, stopping all three in their tracks, the lieutenant said.
Lt. Richard Holicki and Officers Mark Rivera, Michael Walker, Michael Scalese and Anthony Morreale arrived and the trio was taken into custody.
Adrian Maldonado, 19, of Ramsey, Jordan Batista of East Rutherford and Michelle Marinho of Lyndhurst, both 18, got into the building through a basement entrance, Auteri said.
All three teens were charged with burglary and released pending the filing of additional counts, the lieutenant said.
The original Lyndhurst Little Red Schoolhouse, built in 1804, was one of the first public schools in Bergen County.
It was knocked down and rebuilt with a second level in 1849, then leveled again in 1893 and rebuilt into a single-level, one-classroom public school.
The schoolhouse currently operates as a museum of local history and is home to the Lyndhurst Historical Society. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.
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