A suspect in a violent home invasion — who had earlier eluded capture — walked into a South Jersey Wawa soaking wet and asked for a ride, police said.
Surveillance cameras captured the suspect inside the Wawa along Delsea Drive in Malaga hours after he and another man allegedly broke into a man’s Franklin Township home, pistol whipped him and left him bloodied and bound as they fled the scene.
The 42-year-old victim told police he was outside his apartment on Old Dutchmill Road around 7:30 p.m. Sunday when two men suddenly grabbed him and shoved him inside his home. The men then struck him in the head and face with a handgun and tied his hands and feet with duct tape, police said.
A neighbor heard the victim’s cries for help and called police. Several state and local law enforcement agencies flocked to the scene, where they found the victim tied up inside.
"Boom, cops just swarmed," said the victim's neighbor, Joshua Fagan.
Police said they spotted one of the suspects when they arrived. Witnesses told NBC10 at first it appeared the suspect would surrender.
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"He said, 'I stop, I submit,'" Fagan recalled. "Then he hopped the fence anyway."
Police said the suspect dropped his baseball cap and duct tape while running through a swamp. He later turned up at Wawa — about one-fifth of a mile away — wet and asking for a ride, according to investigators. Police later recovered the weapon they said the suspects used to pistol whip the victim.
The home invasion victim suffered several deep lacerations on his head and hands. He was taken to the hospital, where he underwent surgery on his thumb, investigators said.
Both suspects remained on the loose early Tuesday.
Anyone with information on the incident, or who recognizes the suspects, should contact Det. Sergeant Kenneth Gonzalez at 856-694-1415, ext. 132.
