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Authorities Announce Arrest of Second Person Charged in 2021 Edgewater Park Double Homicide

The investigation revealed that the shootings followed a confrontation that allegedly took place earlier in the evening at a water ice store in Willingboro.

Yefaan Thompson

On May 5, 2023, Burlington County Prosecutor LaChia L. Bradshaw and Edgewater Park Township Police Chief Brett V. Evans announced that a 37-year-old Willingboro man has been charged with fatally shooting two men who were inside a vehicle in the parking lot of a Woodlane Road apartment complex in early 2021 in Edgewater Park Township.

Yefaan Thompson, of Marboro Lane, was charged with two counts of Murder (First Degree), Conspiracy (First Degree), Unlawful Possession of a Weapon (Second Degree), Possession of a Weapon for an Unlawful Purpose (Second Degree) and Aggravated Assault (Second Degree).

He was taken into custody April 24 in Westampton by the U.S. Marshals Service New York/New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force and lodged in the Burlington County Jail in Mount Holly.

A Superior Court judge ordered him to be detained pending trial. The case will now be prepared for presentation to a grand jury.

Co-Defendant Arrested & Charged

Thompson is the second person to be charged with fatally shooting Sadiel Gonzalez, 25, and Altarrek Bell, 18, as they were parking their car at the Orchard Park Apartments with two other people inside on March 27, 2021.

Andre Price, 35, of Willingboro, was arrested in the summer of 2021 in Virginia and charged with two counts of Murder (First Degree), Unlawful Possession of a Weapon (Second Degree), Possession of a Weapon for an Unlawful Purpose (Second Degree) and Certain Persons Not to Possess Weapons (Second Degree). He is in the Burlington County Jail pending trial.

The investigation revealed that the shootings followed a confrontation earlier in the evening at a water ice store in Willingboro. The defendants are accused of following the victims to the complex, pulling up beside their vehicle, and firing multiple shots before speeding away.

Gonzalez, who lived at the complex, was in the driver’s seat and Bell, a North Carolina resident, was in the back. Both were pronounced dead at the scene. The other occupants were not struck by gunfire.

The homicides were investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office and the Edgewater Park Township Police Department. The lead detectives are BCPO Detective Sergeant Brian Cunningham and EPTPD Sergeant Charles Ryder Jr. The defendants will be prosecuted by Assistant Prosecutors Jamie Hutchinson and Melissa O’Mara.

All persons are considered innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law.

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