A longshoreman has been sentenced to three years in state prison for being responsible for the drunk-driving incident that caused the death of a female coworker at an Elizabeth marine terminal in 2015, acting Union County Prosecutor Ann M. Luvera announced Tuesday.
State Superior Court Judge Robert Kirsch issued the sentence against Victor M. Belo, 50, of North Arlington, who last year pleaded guilty to a single count of second-degree vehicular manslaughter in connection with the death of 49-year-old Judy Jones of Newark.
According to authorities, in the afternoon of August 7, 2015, emergency medical personnel and members of the Port Authority Police Department responded to the APM terminal in Elizabeth to find Jones suffering from multiple severe injuries, according to Union County Assistant Prosecutor Colleen Ruppert, who prosecuted the case. Jones was pronounced dead at the scene.
A joint investigation led by Port Authority Police Department Detective Robert Caron and also involving members of the Union County Homicide Task Force determined that Belo allegedly struck Jones with a top loader he had been driving while his blood-alcohol level was over the legal limit of 0.08 percent, having had several alcoholic beverages with lunch before returning to work that day, Ruppert said.
Belo turned himself in to police in August 2015, and he was lodged in Union County Jail on $75,000 bail.