A man wanted for a violent 2005 deadly stabbing in a Newark neighborhood has pled guilty to the crime after fleeing the country and remaining at-large for more than ten years.
According to the victim's family, the violent interaction happened in the 100 block of South 8th Street on April 2005 when the suspect Mr. Rene Checo chased 40-year old Mr. Dantz Hester down South 8th Street with a knife in hand.
Checo enraged after his family members informed him that Hester was the person responsible for a burglary that occurred at The Crosstown liquor store on 12th Avenue and South 8th Street where Checo was part owner Hester's family told RLS Metro Breaking News.
The foot pursuit ended when Checo caught Hester on a front porch owned by Hester's family and began to stab Hester to the upper torso savagely. Checo then pulled the severely bleeding Hester off of the porch and onto the sidewalk where he allegedly continued to stab him multiple times leaving him to die on the street.
Police and EMS arrived a short time after the attack and pronounced Hester dead at the scene. Police apprehended Checo at his home and charged him with the crime.
According to a statement released by a spokesperson for the Essex County Prosecutor's Office, Checo was initially arraigned ten years ago with his passport confiscated by the court.
The spokesperson said, after Checo had left the court, they believe that he obtained a copy of his passport from the Dominican Consulate -where he is a citizen of the Dominican Republic- then fled the country.
Authorities returned Checo on or around March 8th, 2017, after a lengthy extradition process, where he pled guilty on Monday to aggravated manslaughter according to the prosecutor.
Checo is expected to be sentenced as a second-degree offender to 7 years in prison in which he must serve 85% of his sentence before he is eligible for parole the spokesperson said.