Men Admit To Middlesex County Check-Cashing Robbery With Gun

OLD BRIDGE, NJ — Two Brooklyn men admitted they committed three gunpoint robberies of check-cashing locations in New Jersey in 2021 and 2022 — and one of those check-cashing businesses was in Old Bridge.

The burglarized the Old Bridge check-cashing business (unnamed) on November 6, 2021.

U.S. Attorney Philip Sellinger announced their guilty pleas Thursday.

Ramel Harris, 42, of Brooklyn, and Neville Brown, 40, of Brooklyn, pleaded guilty Aug. 14 in Newark federal court to three counts of Hobbs Act conspiracy, Hobbs Act robbery and using a firearm during a crime.

Federal prosecutors say they committed the armed robberies from January 2, 2021 through September 3, 2022, robbing or attempting to rob check-cashing businesses in New Jersey: Hackettstown, Parsippany-Troy Hills and Old Bridge, in the Bronx, Rockland (Nanuet) and Westchester (West Chester) in New York, in Kings County on Long Island and in West Chester and Allentown in Pennsylvania.

They brandished a gun in all three incidents and used zip ties to restrain employees at each location. During those robberies, Harris and Brown stole over $578,000.

Law enforcement obtained video surveillance footage that ultimately linked Harris and Brown to the robberies. Cell phone records indicate that Harris’s and Brown’s cell phones were around the locations of the various robberies around the times they were committed.