KEYPORT, N.J.—A New Jersey man whose number was found in the back pocket of one of the perpetrators of last week’s fatal attack on a Jewish market has been arrested for illegally possessing a weapon, federal authorities said.
Ahmed A-Hady, of Keyport, 35, was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm, the U.S. attorney’s office said late Saturday. A-Hady hasn’t been charged with providing any of the weapons used in Tuesday’s bloody rampage in Jersey City.
The number belonged to A-Hady, and the address was for a storefront for a pawnshop, officials said. Records indicated that A-Hady had bought two handguns in 2007 before being convicted of a felony in 2012 that made him ineligible to own firearms.
When authorities went to the pawnshop and interviewed A-Hady, he acknowledged still owning the weapons but denied that they were on the premises. But after receiving a tip about a safe, investigators searched the business and A-Hady’s home and found weapons including three AR-15-style assault rifles, three handguns and one shotgun as well as more than 400 rounds of ammunition, “including a large number of hollow point bullets.”
No information was provided about any possible relationship between A-Hady and the attackers. A-Hady is expected to appear Monday before a federal magistrate; it’s unclear whether he has an attorney, and a message could not be left at a number listed in his name.
In addition to Seals, the attackers killed Mindel Ferencz, 31, who co-owned the grocery; 24-year-old Moshe Deutsch, a rabbinical student from Brooklyn who was shopping there; and store employee Douglas Miguel Rodriguez, 49, New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said last week.
A fourth person in the store was shot and wounded but managed to escape, authorities said.
Anderson and Graham are also prime suspects in the slaying of a livery driver found dead in a car trunk in nearby Bayonne the previous weekend, authorities have said.