New Jersey man wanted for car slashing, DUI faces new charges

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A New Jersey man accused of damaging the wrong car while attempting to target his ex’s new boyfriend now faces additional charges of witness tampering and filing two false police reports.

This comes as Ajinkya Kelkar, 21, of South Brunswick, is currently under house arrest in Boca Raton, Florida, awaiting trial for a vehicular homicide in West Palm Beach last summer.

Police say Kelkar was involved in a car crash is July 2016 where he killed a 38-year-old West Palm Beach man. Kelkar was drunk driving at the time, police said. According to local media reports, Kelkar admitted to drinking two Long Island ice teas before getting in his pick-up truck and causing a three-vehicle collision in West Palm Beach. He reportedly left the scene of the crash.

In South Brunswick, Kelkar is charged with slashing the tires of five different cars, scrawling obscenities over one of them, last Mother’s Day. Kelkar, known as “AJ,” wanted to get revenge on a man dating his ex-girlfriend, but went to the wrong house on Friendship Road and slashed the tires there, South Brunswick police told Patch at the time.

“The incident ruined our Mother’s Day as we had to get all new tires, and Mom couldn’t sleep the rest of the night seeing the video of the man walking around the property with the knife,” the Friendship Road victims told nj.com last May.

Kelkar was charged with causing over $10,000 in damage in the tire slashing. He had a March 3 court appearance on those charges, but South Brunswick police say he filed a false complaint earlier this month in an attempt to impede those court proceedings:

On Feb. 12, an anonymous caller contacted South Brunswick police headquarters to allege police misconduct. The caller told police that officers had been sent to a call on Feb. 11, about a party off Davidson Mill Road. The caller said one of the responding officers had covered up the party and failed to take action. Police then traced the anonymous call to Boca Raton, Fla., where Kelkar had moved, according to Hayducka.

An investigation by the head of the South Brunswick Police Department Professional Standards Bureau, Lt. James Kinard, found that there was no incident on that night.

However, that night an anonymous caller had contacted police to report a party off Davidson Mill Road, but when officers arrived there were no signs of any event.

Kelkar believed the allegations would impact officers involved with his Mother’s Day arrest from testifying in his upcoming court proceedings, Police Chief Raymond Hayducka said in a press release.

The officer involved in Kelkar’s earlier arrest was alleged to be part of the supposed coverup, which police investigated and determined to be false, Hayducka said.