EXCLUSIVE: An Allendale landlord found with a cache of weapons, ammo and explosives after allegedly threatening his tenant with a .357 Magnum has rejected a plea deal and is apparently headed to trial in June, CLIFFVIEW PILOT has learned.

The Bergen County Police SWAT team was called to Don Scott’s West Crescent Avenue house after the tenant said Scott pointed a gun at him during a dispute on the back patio last summer.

Authorities said Scott didn’t have a permit for a defaced Ruger .357 Magnum that they said turned up during a search of the house.

They also found several other guns, two sets of metal knuckles, hollow-nosed bullets and an explosive fireworks device with artillery-level power that didn’t have “an explainable lawful purpose,” according to an 11-count indictment returned against Scott by a Bergen County grand jury.

Scott, 57, has been held on $100,000 bail in the Bergen County Jail since his July 10 arrest.

Prosecutors said they offered him a five-year prison sentence, with parole eligibility after three years, in exchange for a guilty plea, but Scott declined to take it.

The charges against him include:

• pointing a firearm with “manifest indifference to human life”;

• several counts of firearms possession, including a separate charge for having a defaced firearm and another for “using it unlawfully against another person”;

• having an unregistered assault weapon with a large-capacity magazine;

• illegally possessing bronze and silver knuckles, as well as holow-nosed bullets;

• illegally possessing a Class 1.3G explosive device measuring 11-3/4” TBB-1601 artillery without an explainable lawful purpose.

  STORY by Mary K. Miraglia, CLIFFVIEW PILOT Courthouse Reporter

Share This

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

About the author

cliffviewpilot

Related Posts

Allendale police: DWI charge against motorist who sideswiped train

YOU READ IT HERE FIRST: Allendale police charged a 21-year-old Franklin Lakes man whose car was hit by a commuter train as he drove alongside the tracks this morning with DWI. Kevin Jongsma, who was taken to Hackensack...

Allendale firefighters cut out pickup driver after tree crash

EXCLUSIVE (ONLY ON CVP): Allendale firefighters used the "Jaws of Life" to free driver from his black pickup tonight after it struck a tree on Forest Road. The truck rammed the tree near Donny Brook Drive just after 9 p.m. Forest...

‘Touch DNA’ test leads to arrest in murder of East Rutherford woman

EXCLUSIVE: Highly sensitive state-of-the-art DNA testing by the New York City Medical Examiner's Office led investigators to the man arrested last night in the bludgeoning and burning of a 70-year-old East Rutherford woman,...

2 Comments for Allendale landlord going to trial on illegal weapons, ammo, explosives charges

Glenn M. Muller

The article gives the impression that possessing hollow-point ammo is in itself not a crime in New Jersey. This is not the case.

N.J.S.A 2C:39-3f(1) limits the possession of hollow nose ammunition. However, there is a general exception that allows for the purchase of this ammunition but restricts the possession of it to specified locations. This exception provides that:

(2) Nothing is sub section f (1) shall be construed to prevent a person from keeping such ammunition at his dwelling, premises or other land owned or possessed by him, or from carrying such ammunition from the place of purchase to said dwelling or land . . . [N.J.S.A 26:39-3g (2)].

Thus a person may purchase this ammunition and keep it within the confines of his property. Sub section f (1) further exempts from the prohibited possession of hollow nose ammunition “persons engaged in activities pursuant to N.J.S.A 2C:39-6f. . . .”
N.J.S.A 26:39-3f. (1).

Glenn M. Muller

First line should read “The article gives the impression that possessing hollow-point ammo is in itself a crime “