An Essex County resident has been charged with killing a Rahway woman in her home a little more than a week ago, acting Union County Prosecutor Grace H. Park announced Wednesday.
Roberto Grillo, 36, of Bloomfield is charged with a single count of murder in connection with the death of 35-year-old Yolanda Vega.
Members of the Union County Homicide Task Force and the Rahway Police Department responded to a home on Beacon Street in Rahway during the early morning hours of Monday, December 7 to find Vega inside, and she was pronounced dead at the scene.
An autopsy performed by the Union County Medical Examiner’s Office determined Vega’s manner of death to have been homicide, with the cause of death determined to be strangulation.
An intensive joint investigation involving the Homicide Task Force, the Prosecutor’s Office’s High Tech Unit, the Rahway Police Department, the Linden Police Department, and the Union County Sheriff’s Office Identification Unit resulted in Grillo, who was known to Vega and her family, being identified as a suspect in the case.
He was charged with murder late Tuesday night while in custody at Union County Jail, having been arrested by Linden police for trespassing at the Phillips 66 Bayway Refinery in Linden on the evening of Sunday, December 6 – approximately 90 minutes after Vega was determined to have been killed, and at a location less than half a mile from her home.
Bail for Grillo was set at $2 million by state Superior Court Judge William Daniel. Convictions on first-degree murder charges are commonly punishable by 30 years to life in state prison.