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After originally pleading guilty to several charges, Luis Figueroa, 41, withdrew his plea and took his chances with federal jurors in Newark. They ended up convicting him following a two-week trial.
So now, instead of the 26-year deal that he originally accepted from the government, Figueroa could be sentenced to nearly 50 years in federal prison.
The rampage had an “almost unimaginable level of violence and depravity,” U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger said.
Figueroa had been wanted on outstanding DWI warrants when he waited outside the Hazleton, PA apartment of his former girlfriend, with whom he had a young child, the morning of June 6, 2014.
“I told you I was going to kill you,” he said after hitting her in the face with a 12-gauge shotgun.
He also tangled with the former girlfriend’s sister, who was eight months pregnant at the time, knocking her down a flight of stairs. Another family member pulled the child into a bedroom for protection.
Figueroa then pointed the shotgun at his ex-girlfriend and forced her into the back seat of his car. He drove to New Jersey, eventually stopping at a rest area near the federal Kittatinny Point Visitor’s Center, 60 miles from Hazelton.
Figueroa got out to ditch the shotgun, and the woman quickly slid into the driver’s seat and drove to a local post office in Warren County. She was bleeding from the head and fading in and out of consciousness responders said at the time.
Back at the rest stop, Figueroa assaulted a national parks service worker, slamming his head against a door and threatening to hurt him worse unless he handed over the keys to his minivan.
Figueroa took the minivan and then drove another 60 miles to Hosanna Motors in Paterson, where he tried trading in the stolen vehicle for an Escalade, authorities said.
When the salesperson refused, Figueroa got a portable gas can, filled it at a nearby service station and then returned to the dealership.
After a brief struggle with a dealership employee, Figueroa doused an office shed with the gasoline and ignited a fire that engulfed it.
He also set himself on fire in the process and extinguished the flames with a garden hose. He then headed to New York in a stolen SUV.
The vehicle later struck a marked Port Authority Suburban with one officer inside at the George Washington Bridge’s upper level toll plaza, pushing it onto a concrete divider.
Figueroa continued across the bridge, hitting a PAPD sedan at the 179th Street ramp.
He abandoned the disabled Cadillac at the ramp to 179th Street and tried to run, but Port Authority police captured him. They also found a machete in the car.
Figueroa was brought to Weill Cornell Medical Center for treatment of burns from the dealership fire. Three PAPD officers were treated for cuts and bruises at Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck.
Figueroa – who had addresses in Ridgefield and the Bronx when he was arrested -- will continue to remain in custody until he’s sentenced by U.S. District Judge John Michael Vazquez in Newark on Sept. 8 in Newark and assigned to a federal prison.
Figueroa will have to serve nearly all of his sentence because there’s no parole in the federal prison system.
Sellinger credited special agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives for the investigation leading to the verdict.
He also thanked:
- Hazelton City, PA police, the Luzerne County, PA, District Attorney’s Office, Pennsylvania State Police;
- New Jersey State Police; the Warren County Prosecutor’s Office, Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office and Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office;
- the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Police Department and the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
“All of the federal, state and local law enforcement agencies that worked on finding, capturing and prosecuting [Figueroa] did outstanding work in this case,” Sellinger said. “This conviction, and the severe punishment the defendant now faces, should ensure that he is no longer a threat to public safety.”
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Vera Varshavsky and Naazneen Khan of the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s Criminal Division in Newark will handle the sentencing. They secured the guilty verdicts from federal jurors against Figueroa this past week for kidnapping, criminal sexual assault, assaulting a U.S. government employee and firearms possession.
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