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James W. Parrillo Jr., 57, may have done the same thing to other women in other states, New Jersey Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin and State Police Supt. Colonel Patrick J. Callahan said in a joint statement on Feb. 17.
Parillo was captured after the woman escaped from a residence in Bass Township where she’d been confined and fled to a nearby gas station, they said.
Authorities charged Parillo with first-degree kidnapping, criminal restraint, aggravated assault and strangulation, as well as hindering apprehension, obstruction and refusing to provide a DNA sample.
According to Platkin and Callahan:
The victim met Parillo – whom she knew as “Brett Parker” – at a gas station on Interstate 10 in New Mexico sometime in February 2022. At his request, she agreed to give him a ride to Arizona.
A consensual relationship lasted about a month, the woman told investigators, before Parillo assaulted her in California. At that point she “felt unable to leave the relationship,” she said.
Parrillo took away her phone, she said, and also confiscated and utilized her debit cards while isolating her from her family.
The pair arrived in New Jersey sometime in December and had been in the rented room in Burlington County with other residents for roughly two weeks when she began planning her escape.
Parrillo had beaten and choked her during an argument, then let up when he realized they weren’t alone.
Seizing an opportunity, the woman “ran from the house with nothing on but shorts and a shirt in the 42-degree weather,” Platkin and Callahan said in their statement.
“Once inside the gas station, the woman bolted the door and told an attendant she had been kidnapped for approximately a year,” they said.
“Footage from the station’s security camera shows Parrillo following the woman to the gas station and attempting to open the door, then leaving when he found it locked,” Platkin and Callahan said.
An attendant at the station alerted New Jersey State Police, who seized Parrillo a short time later as he walked down County Road 542.
Superior Court Judge Christopher J. Garringer ordered on Friday that Parrillo must remain in the Burlington County Jail until his case is resolved.
The judge acted, in part, on evidence provided by Assistant New Jersey Attorney General Theresa Hilton that Parrillo “may have engaged in similar predatory conduct with individuals in other states and that public safety demands he not be released,” Platkin and Callahan said in their release.
“This is a deeply disturbing case,” Platkin said.
“We are reaching out to law enforcement across jurisdictions to identify other people who may have additional information on the defendant,” the attorney general said.
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