Detectives believe a second person was involved in the robbery and murder, and warrants have been issued for that person’s arrest.
TRENTON — A 18-year-old was arrested yesterday and charged with murder in the killing of a 31-year-old father of two last month, police said today.
Zaire Smith of Trenton was arrested by the U.S. Marshals NY/NJ Regional Fugitive Task Force yesterday morning and is being held on $1 million full cash bail, Lt. Mark Kieffer said. Police allege that Smith accosted Rasheen Jones as Jones left a corner store the night of July 23.
“We believe the intent was robbery,” Lt. Mark Kieffer said.
Zaire Smith. The hold-up on a dark and isolated part of East Stuyvesant Avenue quickly turned violent, with Jones fatally shot in the head. His body was found by the brother of his girlfriend, police said.
Detectives believe a second person was involved in the robbery and murder, and warrants have been issued for that person’s arrest. Police did not release that suspect’s name today, fearing it would harm their efforts to track the person down.
Jones, who worked at Mason’s barber shop on Pennington Avenue six and seven days a week to support his young family, was remembered as a loving father by co-workers. They said he had gone out to purchase toilet paper for the home he shared with his girlfriend around 9 p.m. on the day he died.
Police gave a significant portion of the credit for Smith’s arrest to Detective Edgar Rios, the primary city investigator on the case, who was wounded in an unrelated gunfight Aug. 15.
Rios remains in critical but stable condition at Capital Health Regional Medical Center, but Kieffer said leads dug up by Rios were essential to cracking the case.
Rios worked on the case with Detective Gary Wasko of the Mercer County Prosecutor’s Office. Warrants for Smith’s arrest were signed Wednesday, and he was captured by the federal fugitive hunters on the 400 block of Rutherford Avenue at 7:20 a.m. yesterday, police said.
The weapon used in the homicide has not been recovered, Kieffer said.
Jones’ death was the city’s 23rd homicide of 2013. Seven other people have been slain in Trenton in the month since then.
Anyone with information on the case is asked to call police at (609) 989-4170 or the Confidential Tip Line at (609) 989-3663.
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