Investigators recovered two different sets of shell casings outside the townhouse complex where Sayreville councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour was shot to death on the night of Feb. 1, 2023, the attorney for the man accused in the shooting, said in court on Monday. Rashad Ali Bynum, of Portsmouth, Virginia, faces charges of murder and weapons offenses in Dwumfour’s killing.
His defense attorney Michael Ashley told the judge Monday that ballistics from two different weapons - 9mm and .38-caliber guns - were found on the street outside the Camelot La Mer townhouse complex, where Dwumfour was gunned down. Ashley told Judge Joseph Paone that the different ballistics suggest there were two shooters involved in the murder – hinting at what would likely be a big part of the defense strategy if the case goes to trial.
Sayreville Councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour was shot to death Wednesday night, Feb. 1, 2023, in her car outside her home in the Camelot at La Mer luxury rental complex. At the crime scene “there were two sets of projectiles and two shooters instead of one,” Ashley told the judge during a status conference held at the courthouse in New Brunswick.
Ashley said the two sets of bullets are detailed in the state’s ballistics report it intends to use at trial, and “at least two” of the projectiles found at the crime scene are .38-caliber, he said. The state has always maintained that Bynum was lone shooter and used a 9mm handgun, which was recovered when authorities arrested him at a residence in Chesapeake City, Virginia, in May 2023.
Ashley did not elaborate in court, but said in the hallway after the hearing that investigators also found a pair of black gloves at the scene. Those gloves were tested for DNA, and matched “another individual who lives in Parlin,” not Bynum, Ashley said. “We think this case is not what the state believes it is,” Ashley said.
“It was not our client. It was not one shooter.” Rashid Ali Bynum ( L ) confers with his attorney, Michael Ashley, in Middlesex County Superior Court on 9/9/24.
Richard Cowen/NJ Advance Media for NJ.Com Although the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office has never offered a motive for the murder, it has said that Bynum met Dwumfour, 30, when they both lived in Virginia and she recruited him into her church group, the Fire Congress Fellowship, a Bible study. The two lived together for a brief time, but the relationship had soured, the prosecutor’s office said.
Assistant Prosecutor Kristen Pridgen did not respond to Ashley’s contention that there were two shooters, given that the purpose of the hearing was to resolve discovery issues in the case. Ashley initially asked the judge for more time to file a brief challenging the warrant used to search Bynum’s cellphone, but Paone said the attorney had already missed a July deadline and instead scheduled the trial to begin in April. “I’m not going to tolerate this,” Paone said of the requests for extensions by the defense.
Pridgen estimated the trial would last four weeks. Paone scheduled a pretrial conference for Nov. 1, with jury selection to begin April 8.
Pridgen said the state has offered Bynum a plea deal of 30 years behind bars with no chance of parole. Ashley said following the hearing that Bynum maintains he is not guilty and intends to stand trial. A Sayreville police officer puts up police tape in a wooded area near the crime scene.
Sayreville Councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour was found shot to death near her home in Sayreville on Wednesday evening. Thursday, February 2, 2023. Patti Sapone | NJ Advance Media for NJ.
com According to the arrest affidavit, investigators pieced together surveillance videos, cell phone records, texts, and E-ZPass data that led them to conclude Bynum was behind the wheel of a white 2017 Hyundai that left Virginia on Feb. 1, 2023, the day of the murder. Using cell tower data, investigators determined Bynum’s cell phone was in the vicinity of the Camelot at La Mer townhouse complex around 7:20 p.
m. that night, when Dwumfour was shot multiple times by an assailant who approached her car, authorities have said. Sayreville Councilwoman Eunice Dwumfour was shot to death outside her home on Wednesday, Feb.
1, 2023. Neighbors heard multiple shots and saw her SUV roll into parked vehicles in her luxury rental complex. (Photos provided by neighhbors) Dwumfour grew up in Newark, and at the time of her death was the pastor of the Champions Royal Assembly, a church in Newark that is an offshoot of an evangelical church based in Nigeria.
Investigators interviewed numerous members of the church, some of whom had lived with Dwumfour as roommates. Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.
com .Richard Cowen may be reached at [email protected] .
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