East Brunswick Schools Locked Down As Suspect Found On Turnpike

EAST BRUNSWICK, NJ — Two East Brunswick schools went into lockdown mode Wednesday afternoon, Halloween, after a man robbed a resident at knife point in the area of Weston Mills Road. NJ State Police K-9 units were even called in to search for the suspect, who was ultimately found on the side of the New Jersey Turnpike a short time later. Police said that same man was known for breaking into cars in East Brunswick, and showing a knife to residents who confronted him.

The incident started at approximately 3 p.m. Oct. 31: East Brunswick police were called to Westons Mills Road on a report of a robbery. It was reported that the man fled the area on a bicycle after robbing a resident at knife point.

Police combed the area, and even the NJ State Police were called in. Nearby Lawrence Brook School and Churchill Junior High were placed into shelter-in-place.

Neighbors in that area identified the wanted man as the same person who had recently committed motor vehicle burglaries, police said. In those earlier instances, Duron Bridgers, 20, of New Brunswick, pulled a knife on residents when they confronted him allegedly breaking into cars, and he would then flee. At least one of those car break-ins occurred on Gage Road, police said.

The search for Bridgers extended to the NJ Turnpike, and State Police K-9 Cullen helped find the man on the side of the Turnpike, police said. He taken into custody without incident. Schools were taken out of shelter-in-place mode.

Bridgers charged with four counts of burglary, resisting arrest, terroristic threats and weapons offenses. His arrest comes the same day Patch reported of a home break-in in East Brunswick, where a man slipped in through an open sliding glass door in the back, and a housekeeper was accused of stealing from a 92-year-old East Brunswick lady.

Related: Man Broke Into East Brunswick Home Through Sliding Door, Cops Say

Housekeeper Charged With Stealing From East Brunswick Woman, 92

Photo: The exterior of Churchill Jr. High, one of the schools place on lockdown, via Google Earth.