Police recover more than $76,000.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: Two men in Union County, New Jersey, were arrested and charged with stealing $76,865 from an Indian grocery outlet owned by community member Sunilkumar V. Patel.
Fausto Ariza Pedraza, 50, and Tito Venegas, 40, were arrested by detectives from the police Special Operations Group and they say they have recovered the misappropriated money to boot.
“It’s extraordinary for police, here or anywhere, to recover such a large amount of money two weeks after a crime,” Police Chief Thomas Bryan said in a news release. “Diligent police work by our detectives led to these arrests and enabled us to return that money to one of our local small-business owners.”
Detective Steve Todd was the lead detective on the case, and it was his examination of crime scene evidence and interviews of store employees that led to Pedraza and Venegas’ arrest. Once in custody, Piscataway Municipal Court Judge Dennis Flackelman set bail at $10,000.
The robbery comes shortly after a rash of home invasions in which Indian American households in Middle Sex County, New Jersey were terrorized by armed, masked intruders. By the end of the spree, five homes had been burglarized.
However, as in the case of Patel’s tormentors, authorities caught the home invasion perpetrators and arraigned them on charges of first degree robbery.
No details of race-related motives have surfaced regarding the brazen burglary of Patel’s establishment.