Barnegat Man Gets 5 Years In Fatal Brick Hit-And-Run

TOMS RIVER, NJ — A Barnegat Township man has been sentenced to five years in prison in a hit-and-run crash that killed a Brick Township man in 2019, the Ocean County Prosecutor's office said Friday.

Craig W. Menth, 38, of Barnegat, pleaded guilty on Jan. 20 to one count of knowingly leaving the scene of a motor vehicle accident resulting in death before Superior Court Judge Michael T. Collins, who pronounced sentence on Friday.

Robert R. Berenger, 28, was found unresponsive on the front lawn of a Drum Point Road home about 200 feet west of Circle Drive after he was hit about 10:45 p.m. Sept. 1, 2019, and was pronounced dead at the scene.

Witnesses described a mid-1990s Dodge work van as the vehicle that hit Berenger, and Brick police found a green Dodge Ram van, with significant damage consistent with the crash, in a residential neighborhood off Drum Point Road.

Brick police then tracked down the vehicle's owner, Menth, and determined it was the vehicle involved in the fatal hit-and-run, police said at the time. He was arrested at his Barnegat home on Sept. 2.

The Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office Vehicular Homicide Unit and Brick Township Police investigated, along with the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office High Tech Crime Unit, Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office Victim Witness Advocacy Unit, and Ocean County Sheriff’s Office Crime Scene Investigation Unit.

Senior Assistant Prosecutor Robert Cassidy handled the case on behalf of the state.