The Essex County Prosecutor’s Office is investigating a reported suicide of a retired Newark cop at Bloomfield Police Department headquarters on Jan. 15, Acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore N. Stephens II announced.
A preliminary investigation indicates that in the evening hours of Tuesday, Jan. 15, retired Newark police Lt. Patrick Montella, 58, of Bloomfield, who had been arrested for an alleged act of domestic violence and who was expected to be released on a summons, shot himself at Bloomfield PD HQ while he was being processed.
He was transported to University Hospital, Newark, where he was pronounced dead at 1:16 a.m., Wednesday, Jan. 16.
The investigation is active and ongoing.
No other information is available at this time.
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