A North Bergen man has been charged with knocking out a postal worker after confronting employees over being boxed into a parking space he wasn’t supposed to use, U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito announced.
By John Heinis/Hudson County View
Eduardo Perez, 34, is charged with one count of assaulting a federal worker. He is scheduled to appear this afternoon before U.S. District Judge Judge Cathy L. Waldor in Newark federal court.
On or about June 22, Perez parked his white pickup truck in an employees-only space in the parking lot of the Woodcliff Station Post Office in North Bergen, authorities said.
When Perez returned to his vehicle after closing time, he found that a postal vehicle was blocking the entrance to the parking lot, per Woodcliff Station policy.
Although the exit from the lot remained unobstructed, Perez became irate and aggressive toward postal employees in the lot, demanding that the postal vehicle be removed from the entrance so that he could exit that way, officials said.
Perez eventually removed his truck from the lot through the exit, nearly striking a postal employee in the process, but returned to the lot only moments later and accosted a postal worker who was unloading parcels from his postal vehicle, officials said.
According to court documents. Perez swung his fist repeatedly toward the victim, striking the victim’s face and causing him to fall backward into his postal vehicle and then to the ground, knocking him unconscious. Perez then fled the scene.
The victim was subsequently hospitalized for severe injuries to his face and head.
Perez was ultimately identified four days later after the postal worker was able to identify him from a police photo lineup, as well as from surveillance footage of the incident, the criminal complaint says.
The charge of assaulting a federal worker carries a maximum potential penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
Carpenito credited postal inspectors of the United States Postal Inspection Service, under the direction of Inspector in Charge James Buthorn in Newark, with the investigation leading to the charges, as well as thanking the North Bergen Police Department for their assistance.
