Jose Garcia | Homicide Watch Trenton

2 self-confessed Trenton killers receive heavy prison sentences

Sulaiman Abdur-Rahman — Fri, 18 Jan 2019 20:22:23 -0500

Justice has been served.

Two self-confessed killers — Jose C. Garcia and Wade Williams — are now serving time in the big house.

Jose C. Garcia (left) and Wade Williams

Garcia, 20, of Hamilton, has been sentenced to 17 years of incarceration for stabbing 48-year-old Brenda Garzio to death. He stabbed the victim multiple times on the on the 900 block of South Broad Street in the capital city about 11:10 p.m. May 28, 2017.

Williams, 43, of Trenton, has been sentenced to 12 years of incarceration for shooting and killing 51-year-old Tyrone “Big Face” King Sr. in broad daylight Sept. 17, 2017. The slaying occurred on the 900 block of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in North Trenton.

Tyrone King

Police arrested Garcia June 1, 2017, charging him with murder. He pleaded guilty to first-degree aggravated manslaughter last October and had his weapons offenses dismissed at the Jan. 9 sentencing hearing. He is currently incarcerated at the Garden State Youth Correctional Facility and is scheduled to be released Nov. 11, 2031, according to the New Jersey Department of Corrections.

Brenda Garzio

Police arrested Williams Dec. 5, 2017, charging him with murder. He pleaded guilty last October to first-degree aggravated manslaughter and had his weapons offenses dismissed at his Jan. 4 sentencing hearing. The 6-foot-2-inch, 400-pound man is currently incarcerated at South Woods State Prison and is scheduled to be released Feb. 15, 2028, according to the DOC.

Williams was previously arrested in August 2013 for distributing drugs in Trenton. He pleaded guilty in that case and was sentenced to four years of incarceration to be served concurrent to his 12-year prison sentence, DOC records show.

Garcia and Williams will both be subjected to five years of parole supervision upon release from state prison, according to court records.

Teen: I killed Brenda Garzio in Trenton in self-defense following sex act

Sulaiman Abdur-Rahman — Tue, 06 Jun 2017 21:44:27 -0400

The teenager accused of murdering Hamilton woman Brenda Garzio says he acted in self-defense when he stabbed the 48-year-old victim to death following a consensual sex act they had over Memorial Day weekend in Trenton, according to a statement he gave to police.

Jose C. Garcia, 18, of Hamilton, told police he is the killer responsible for Garzio’s death but framed the May 28 slaying as a justifiable homicide.

“I do believe that there is a self-defense claim here,” Garcia’s lawyer Malaeika Montgomery said in court on Tuesday, adding the violent encounter between her client and the victim began as a sexual romp between two consenting adults.

“After the conclusion of that sex act, the alleged victim in this incident pulled a knife on Mr. Garcia,” Montgomery said. “The alleged victim then attempted to obtain more money from Mr. Garcia for the services that had been provided. Mr. Garcia truly feared for his life and reacted in that particular moment in that situation.”

Detective Michael Castaldo of the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office arrested Garcia last Thursday on murder charges and weapons offenses after reviewing surveillance footage that depicted Garcia fleeing the area where the homicide occurred on the 900 block of South Broad Street — a troubled area that is well-known to police for quality-of-life issues that include prostitution.

Garcia fully cooperated with police when he gave the statement identifying himself as the killer, according to Montgomery and court documents. The victim on the night of the slaying was screaming for help and screaming for police and suffered multiple stab wounds. She was pronounced dead at the scene.

Prosecutors last Friday filed a motion seeking to keep Garcia locked up without bail while his murder case plays out in court. At Garcia’s detention hearing on Tuesday, Montgomery tried to persuade Mercer County Superior Court Judge Peter Warshaw to release her client from jail on electronically monitored home detention.

“This is not a situation of an individual hunting someone down or simply getting involved in a situation because they are in a gang,” Montgomery said. “This was an unfortunate incident that occurred as a result of Mr. Garcia’s interaction with this victim in this particular situation.”

Garcia, who turns 19 next month, “was brought to headquarters, and he gave a statement, and he acknowledged having stabbed the victim, so the identity is not an issue here,” Warshaw said Tuesday after reviewing the affidavit of probable cause.

Warshaw asked the state on what grounds was it filing the pretrial detention motion against Garcia.

“Your honor, this case has a presumption of detention. It’s a murder case, so that’s the grounds,” Mercer County Assistant Prosecutor John Boyle said. “The state has also listed a danger to the community.”

Boyle also told Warshaw not to consider Garcia’s self-defense argument.

“The defendant may argue self-defense,” Boyle said. “At this point we don’t think that’s a decision for the court. That’s something that the defense has to try to establish in front of a jury in light of the facts here.”

“This is charged as a murder,” Boyle added. “It is a very serious offense. There is a presumption to overcome in this case, and I don’t think simply the assertion of self-defense gets us there.”

Prior to his arrest, Garcia lived with his uncle on Marshall Avenue in Hamilton and did work with his stepfather’s demolition company from time to time, according to statements made in court.

Garcia’s Public Safety Assessment or PSA score recommended he not be released from jail pretrial, although the PSA score graded him as a low-risk defendant. The PSA scale said he had the lowest potential risk of failing to appear in court — scoring him 1 out of 6. The scale also graded him 2 out of 6 on potential risk of committing new criminal activity and suggested he was not at risk for committing new criminal acts of violence.

Garcia did not have any prior contacts with the criminal justice system as an adult but did have an adjudication for a firearms offense from when he was a juvenile, according to additional statements read in court.

Brenda Garzio

“The court has received additional information that subsequent to a consensual sex act of some kind, the argument is that the victim pulled a knife on the defendant and tried to get money from the defendant,” Warshaw said. “The defendant was fearful for his life and he ended up stabbing the victim. I don’t know whether there was one knife, more than one knife, whether the defendant takes a position that he had to disarm the victim, I don’t know any of those things right now, but I do understand and consider the arguments made by defense counsel, particularly that this is something which was between two people if you will, personal if you will, as opposed to something where the court would have a generalized threat to the community, which the court could reasonably perceive.”

But in the end, Warshaw signed the order placing Garcia on pretrial detention.

“The fact is I am satisfied that the presumption (of detention) is appropriately applied to this case,” he said, adding that “the presumption has not been satisfactorily rebutted by proofs.”

In other words, Garcia and his lawyer did not make a compelling enough argument to justify his release from jail while his murder case plays out in court. He could remain incarcerated without bail for up to two years but has a right to appeal his detention order.

Garzio was Trenton’s eighth homicide victim of 2017. She worked as a secretary for the New Jersey Juvenile Justice Commission, up until she took an early retirement after clocking in 25 years and 11 months of public service.

In his defense, Garcia alleges that Garzio had attempted to extort money from him at knifepoint following a consensual sex act, prompting him to kill her about 11:10 p.m. May 28 on the 900 block of South Broad Street in Trenton.

Police in recent years have conducted several undercover stings that resulted in numerous alleged prostitutes getting arrested around the area where Garzio was stabbed to death.

Hamilton woman screams for help, gets stabbed to death in Trenton

Sulaiman Abdur-Rahman — Mon, 29 May 2017 18:54:43 -0400

A 48-year-old Hamilton woman was stabbed to death on the 900 block of South Broad Street in Trenton on Sunday, May 28, 2017. (SULAIMAN ABDUR-RAHMAN - The Trentonian)

Blood continued to spill onto capital city streets during this violent month of May as a woman was stabbed to death over the Memorial Day weekend.

Brenda Garzio, 48, of Hamilton, became Trenton’s eighth homicide victim of 2017 late Sunday night. She was screaming for help about 11:10 p.m. on the 900 block of South Broad Street and police quickly found her suffering from multiple stab wounds, officials said, adding the victim was pronounced dead at the scene.

Brenda Garzio

A resident who lives near the murder site said he had heard the woman calling out for help late Sunday night.

“She was saying, ‘Help me! Help me!,’” the resident, who identified himself as Jose, said Monday morning as he was smoking a cigarette on his front porch. Jose was relaxing inside his house at the time of the incident. He said he looked out of his window upon hearing the woman’s loud screams but noted it was too dark for him to see anything. Minutes later, police arrived on the scene, he said, to investigate what turned out to be the city’s third slaying in three weeks.

The killing appears to have occurred in the alleyway space between 993 and 995 S. Broad Street. Police as of Monday evening have not announced any arrests in connection with the incident and did not have a suspect description. Officers investigated the incident overnight, and detectives returned to the scene later Monday morning to conduct further analysis.

9-1-1 call

Police received a 9-1-1 call concerning a female screaming for help around 11:10 p.m. Sunday, but a police spokesperson on Monday could not confirm whether the call was placed by the victim or a bystander who had heard the screams.

Residents who live on the 900 block of South Broad Street did not seem to know anything about the incident or the homicide victim Monday morning.

Jose has lived in the neighborhood since 2015 and said, “Everything is good,” adding, “I don’t know what happened yesterday.” He called the incident “crazy.”

Another neighborhood resident who was home at the time of the slaying said, “I didn’t hear anything,” adding, “I sleep like a log.”

The resident saw police conducting their crime scene investigation Monday morning but did not know what they were investigating, exactly. “They don’t tell you anything,” he said of the crime-scene detectives.

Detectives on Memorial Day 2017 investigate in the alleyway where a woman was stabbed to death overnight on the 900 block of South Broad Street in Trenton. (SULAIMAN ABDUR-RAHMAN - The Trentonian)

By 10 a.m. Monday, the 900 block of South Broad Street bustled with business as usual, as if a homicide had not occurred. Patrons at a local barbershop were getting their hair cut; customers at R&R Laundromat were washing loads of clothing.

State worker

Before becoming the city’s latest homicide victim, Brenda Garzio used to work as a secretary for the New Jersey Juvenile Justice Commission, according to her LinkedIn page.

After clocking in 25 years and 11 months of service, Garzio took an early retirement from her JJC central office job in August 2011 at age 43, according to state records. Her annual salary was $56,830.39, and in retirement she was collecting a $1,428.22 monthly pension allowance, records show.

Trenton Police and the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office on Monday had few details to release about the stabbing death. Anyone with information is urged to contact the Mercer County Homicide Task Force at (609) 989-6406 or the Trenton Crime Stoppers tip line at (609) 278-8477.

Trentonian staff writers Penny Ray and David Foster contributed to this report.

Female stabbed to death in Trenton

Trentonian Staff — Mon, 29 May 2017 07:44:18 -0400

Blood continues to spill onto capital city streets this violent month of May.

A woman was stabbed to death overnight, marking the city's third murder in three weeks and its eighth homicide this year.

Officials say police received a call regarding a female screaming for help around 11:11 p.m. Sunday. A police spokesperson could not confirm whether the call was placed by the victim or a bystander who heard the screams.

Police were then dispatched to the rear of the 900 block of South Broad Street where they found 48-year-old Brenda Garzio, of Hamilton, suffering from multiple stab wounds.

Garzio was pronounced dead at the scene.

As of now, no one has been arrested in connection with the killing and police do not have a suspect description.

Read full story here.