Freehold Twp Murder-Suicide: What We've Learned

FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP, NJ — A day after authorities found Denise A. Barton dead in her family's home and pulled the body of Kenneth J. Barton from the Raritan River, what exactly happened to the Freehold Township couple remains a mystery.

The Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office late Monday afternoon said they were investigating the death of Denise Bartone, 48, as a homicide. The death of her husband, Kenneth, 53, was "an apparent suicide," they said.

"We do not believe there is any further danger to the public," a statement from the prosecutor's office on Monday said. But the prosecutor's office has not said what investigators have learned about the couple or their deaths so far.

Here's what Patch has learned:

• Kenneth Bartone is believed to have jumped from the Thomas Edison Memorial Bridge in Woodbridge sometime early Monday.
• Denise Bartone was found dead sometime before 7:30 a.m.; a neighbor told the Asbury Park Press that there were police at the home at 123 Koster Drive in Freehold Township about that time, when the neighbor was leaving for work.
• One of the family's vehicles was found on the bridge early Monday, and a search of the river below ensued. Kenneth Bartone's body was found shortly before 2 p.m., NBC New York reported.
• Denise Bartone was a marketing specialist with the Rutgers Food Innovation Center in Piscataway, where she was project director of the Food Industry Talent Network. Her Linkedin profile shows she had just started working for the Food Innovation Center in June 2018; it appeared she took time off from her career to raise the couple's three daughters, all of whom are now teenagers.
• Kenneth Bartone was a scientist with Allied Signal, which now is Honeywell International, the Asbury Park Press reported. He was cited as one of the inventors in at least three patent filings by Allied Signal involving metal injection molds. Allied Signal acquired Honeywell in 1999 and kept the Honeywell name; the companies are involved in aerospace, chemical products, automotive parts, and building controls, according to the Honeywell website.
• Denise Bartone was heavily involved with the Freehold Township Education Foundation, including spending the 2017-2018 school year chairing the foundation's board of trustees. Numerous photos on Twitter show her presenting checks to various schools in the Freehold Township School District, which serves kindergarten-through-eighth graders.
• Denise Bartone had an active social media presence. On Linkedin she frequently shared news about the Food Innovation Network. Public photos on her Facebook page include several of her and Kenneth smiling at a variety of events, along with family vacation photos. On Twitter, she was a fan of John Stamos, with a number of older tweets about the actor, and proudly showed photos of herself meeting other stars, including Ralph Macchio from "The Karate Kid" movies.

• Kenneth Bartone had no apparent social media accounts.
• The couple's daughters were home at the time Denise Bartone was killed but the three were not physically harmed, the publication reported.
• The couple bought the Koster Drive home in 2004.
• Neighbors who spoke to the Asbury Park Press said the family was quiet.; the publication said there was no history of domestic violence reports from the home.
• In addition to the Koster Drive home, the couple owned two townhouses in Howell's Pointe O' Woods development; one was purchased in 2002 and the other in 2015, according to public records.

READ MORE: Freehold Twp Couple Dead In Murder-Suicide: Prosecutor

The Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office said Monday's investigation with the Freehold Township Police Department received assistance from the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office, New Jersey State Police, Woodbridge Police Department and Sayreville Police Department ,

The investigation is continuing and anyone with information is urged to call Detective Andrea Tozzi of the prosecutor's office at 1-800-733-7443 or call Freehold Township Police Detective James Burdge at 732-462-7908.

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