Crime & Safety

Man Charged In Nightclub Beer Bottle Brawl

A 27-year-old smashed a bottle in another man's face early Sunday morning then drove off, according to cops. The alleged attacker's girlfriend was also charged after she tried to cover up for him, police say.

A Bayonne man was charged early Sunday morning in connection with an incident at a Fort Lee nightclub in which he allegedly smashed a beer bottle in the face of another club patron and then fled the scene, authorities said.

His girlfriend was also charged with hindering, when she allegedly lied to officers in an apparent attempt to protect him, according to police.

Fort Lee Police, responding to a call of a fight at the Soho Nightclub on Lemoine Avenue just after 2 a.m. Sunday, found a male victim with “several facial lacerations” and a female patron who was also injured “when the bottle shattered and glass struck her in her eye,” said Detective Sergeant Ken Porrino of the Fort Lee Police Department.

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Cops determined that Jose Carvajal, 27, had allegedly hit the man in the face with the bottle and then took off in his car.

While at the club, Police also interviewed Jennifer Sanchez, 29, and later determined that she was Carvajal’s girlfriend.

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Sanchez, also of Bayonne, allegedly lied to the officers, telling them she wasn’t aware of the incident and didn’t know Carvajal, according to police.

After getting a description Carvajal and the vehicle he drove off in, police found Carvajal in the vehicle just a few blocks away from the nightclub and arrested him, Porrino said.

After officers determined that Sanchez had allegedly lied to protect her boyfriend, she was arrested as well and charged with hindering apprehension, police said.

Carvajal was charged with two counts of aggravated assault, possession of a weapon and possession of a weapon for unlawful purpose and is currently being held at the Bergen County Jail in lieu of $25,000 bail, according to police.

Sanchez was released on her own recognizance, police said.

Both victims were taken to Hackensack University Medical Center.

"The female victim was seeing an eye specialist," Porrino said. "The male victim had a broken nose and numerous lacerations that needed stitches."


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