Bloomfield Man Gets 55 Years In Jail For Murdering Rahway Woman

BLOOMFIELD, NJ — An Essex County man who murdered a woman inside her Rahway home three years ago was sentenced to 55 years in state prison for the crime, authorities announced Monday.

Roberto Grillo, 39, of Bloomfield must serve a minimum of slightly more than 51 years in state prison before becoming eligible for parole under the terms set down Friday by a state superior court judge, the Union County Prosecutor’s Office stated.

Prosecutors said that members of the Union County Homicide Task Force and the Rahway Police Department responded to a home on Beacon Street in Rahway during the early hours of Monday, Dec. 7, 2015 and found the body of 35-year-old Yolanda Vega inside.

Vega was pronounced dead at the scene, authorities said.

An autopsy performed by the Union County Medical Examiner’s Office determined Vega’s manner of death to be homicide, with the cause of death determined to be strangulation, prosecutors said.

According to prosecutors:

“An intensive joint investigation involving the Homicide Task Force, the Prosecutor’s Office’s High Tech Unit, the Rahway Police Department, the Linden Police Department, and the Union County Sheriff’s Office Identification Unit resulted in Grillo, who was known to Vega and her family, being identified as a suspect in the case. He was charged approximately one week after Vega’s death while in custody at Union County Jail, having been arrested by Linden police for trespassing at the Phillips 66 Bayway Refinery in Linden on the evening of Sunday, December 6, 2015 – approximately 90 minutes after Vega was killed, and at a location less than half a mile from her home.”

Prosecutors continued:

“Immediately following the murder charge being filed, bail for Grillo was set at $2 million by state Superior Court Judge William Daniel. A Union County grand jury handed down a 10-count indictment against Grillo in May 2016, charging him with first-degree murder, first-degree felony murder, second-degree burglary, six related weapons offenses, and fourth-degree criminal trespassing; he was convicted of all 10 counts following a month-long trial that ended in October 2018.”

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