Robbers Punch Victim in the Face, Steal $70K

Police are looking for masked men who beat up an employee walking into a Mahwah business Tuesday evening and stole about $70,000 in cash he was carrying, Chief Jim Batelli said Tuesday night.

Police are reviewing surveillance tapes from outside the Marron professional building on Route 17 South in Mahwah to help identify and locate up to four men who were involved in the unarmed robbery at about 5 p.m. Tuesday, Batelli said.

According to police, a 54-year-old employee of one of the companies in the building was walking from his car to the rear entrance of the building carrying a bag with about $70,000 in cash inside it. The man, who police are not identifying, had picked up the money from gas stations in Mahwah and Elizabeth and was delivering the cash to his corporate headquarters in the Marron building, Batelli said.

On his way into the building, two men wearing masks approached the man, and “punched [him] repeatedly in the face until he was knocked to the ground,” Batelli said. The two men stole the bag of cash, and fled in a gold sedan, possibly down Route 17 South, police said.

Detectives looking at surveillance tapes say there may be four men involved in the robbery, and that two of the men may have been in the Marron building hours before the robbery occurred, Batelli said.

Police have also released descriptions of the two suspects who beat the victim and nabbed the cash – one is a male wearing a black jacket and hoody, and a red baseball cap with a gold sticker on it, and one is a male wearing all black, with a black mask covering any facial features, cops said.

Though he said he could not release the name of the affected business or many details on the ongoing investigation into the robbery, Batelli said the police department is following up on some “very active leads.”

Mahwah Lieutenant Philip Tangel, Officers Daniel Stewart, Jonathan Lange, Michael Jack and K-9 Officer Robert Rapp responded to the scene, and the county Bureau of Criminal Investigation processed the scene for evidence. Mahwah Detective Kevin Herbert is leading the ongoing investigation into the robbery and search for the involved suspects.

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