Crime & Safety

Prosecutor: Accomplice in Synagogue Attacks Had School Blueprint Marked 'Project Anarchy'

Bail stays at $2.5 million after hearing Wednesday.

The 19-year-old man charged in connection with a series of anti-Semitic attacks on area synagogues had a blueprint of a school in Camden County marked for another attack and labeled “Project Anarchy,” according to a report on northjersey.com.

Investigators found the blueprint of John F. Kennedy Memorial Elementary School, in West Berlin, during a search of Aakash Dalal’s apartment, Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor Martin Delaney said at a bail hearing Wednesday, the report said.

Prosecutors did not say how Dalal may have obtained the blueprints or why he allegedly focused on the south Jersey school. There was no record of any related charges being filed against Dalal, a Camden County Prosecutor’s Office spokesman said Wednesday afternoon.

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Bergen County prosecutors , of Lodi and formerly of Hasbrouck Heights, to firebomb synagogues in Paramus and Rutherford. In , prosecutors say Graziano tossed Molotov cocktails through a bedroom window while the rabbi and his family slept.

Dalal instructed Graziano on how to make firebombs used in the arson spree, prosecutors said. Transcripts of online chats, released by prosecutors, seem to indicate Graziano was trying to impress Dalal.

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"Basically no damage," Dalal allegedly wrote after one attack in Paramus did little damage. "It did nothing. You haven't proven yourself."

"So how much damage would be acceptable?" Graziano allegedly asked.

"Serious damage," Dalal allegedly responded. "Or total burnage."

Dalal’s defense attorney, Chris DeLorenzo, said his client was being prosecuted for “malicious words,” the northjersey.com report said.

A judge rejected a defense move to have Dalal’s $2.5 million bail lowered at Wednesday’s hearing. He remained held at the Bergen County Jail on charges including aggravated arson, criminal mischief and bias intimidation.

Dalal and Graziano also spray painted anti-Semitic graffiti on  in December, prosecutors say.

The attacks  and promoted police to beef up security at. 

Dalal and Graziano have pleaded not guilty.


 


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