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Stolen Car Search Yields 3 Guns, Drugs For Passaic Sheriff's Officers

PATERSON, N.J. -- Passaic County sheriff's officers searching for a stolen car instead found a trio of firearms -- including a submachine gun -- along with heroin and pot for sale in a Paterson apartment house, authorities said Sunday.

Emmanuel Bush, 72-74 North 3rd Street

Emmanuel Bush, 72-74 North 3rd Street

Photo Credit: INSET: Courtesy PASSAIC COUNTY SHERIFF / Photo: Googlemaps

Detective Jose Vargas and Officers Chazz Gonzalez, Francesca Vollaro and Kiril Sekulovski were searching for the car when people told the'd seen a man named "Manny" enter the North 3 Street house carrying a silver handgun and leave, Police Chief Richard H. Berdnik said.

Discovering that the second-floor apartment he'd entered was vacant, Vargas investigated.

Through the open door he could see a table with empty ziplocking bags, a scale and other drug parckaging materials -- along with the submachine gun, Berdnik said.

Vargas secured the firearm -- which held an extended magazine and hollow-point bullets -- rendered it safe, the sheriff said.

Several minutes later, "Manny" showed up.

"He froze and stutter-stepped as if he was going to run" but stayed and told Vargas he stayed in the second-floor apartment, Berdnik said.

He consented to a search, whic turned up two more guns, along with four bundles of packaged heroin and marijuana in heat-sealeted plastic bags, the sheriff said.

"Three guns off the streets, is a positive victory against street violence," Berdnik said.

A judge ordered Bush held without bail in the Passaic County Jail pending a bail hearing on drug and weapons offenses.

Additional charges were possible, the sheriff said.

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