Newark police lieutenant fatally shoots ex-wife, injures her boyfriend: police
JEFFERSON TOWNSHIP, N.J. — A Newark police lieutenant is in police custody for allegedly killing his estranged ex-wife and injuring her boyfriend, authorities said Monday.
Photo of the house authorities say NJ police officer killed his ex-wife and injured her boyfriend.
Lt. John Formisano allegedly shot and killed his ex-wife and shot her boyfriend inside a home located on Mirror Place in Jefferson Township around 11:20 p.m. Sunday night, according to police.
Formisano, who worked for the Newark Police Department for 24 years, was taken into custody at his parents house in Livingston New Jersey, according to NJ.com.
A retired Passaic County Sheriff’s Officer who lives in the neighborhood told NJ.com that a neighbor saw the shooter.
“(Formisano) went in the front door, ” Thomas Verrone said. “He shot the boyfriend three times and he shot the wife two times. She ran out of that house, went to next-door neighbor banging on the door, yelling she had been shot. But it was late at night so no one answered. He came out, followed her and she went to the other neighbor’s house. She opened the (screen) door and then he unloaded more on her she fell there.”
Julia Rivera, who was visiting her boyfriend near the victims’m home told the Morristown Daily Record that she heard multiple gun shots around the time the alleged incident took place.
“We heard three shots,” Rivera said. “I’ve never heard gunshots before so in my mind I’m thinking they were fireworks. And then we hear police. Our phones started blowing up, ‘Lock your doors, there was a shooting.’ And then we see everywhere, all over, that there was a shooting. The stories were coming out.”
Formisano was immediately suspended without pay, according to the Newark Police Department.
The ex-wife’s name has not yet been released and the condition of the boyfriend is unknown.