A Somers Point man was ordered held in jail Monday, after he allegedly stole $13,000 in jewelry from a Ventnor home.
Jason Gallagher, 44, was allegedly shown on a Ring doorbell camera entering the home through an unsecured bedroom window earlier this month, according to the charges.
“It wasn’t me,” Gallagher said as the affidavit was read before the judge via a virtual court hearing.
But Assistant Prosecutor Rick McKelvey said one of the items was found at a local pawn shop, where the photo and name of the person who pawned it matched Gallagher.
When he was arrested, Gallagher told law enforcement that “his memory was faint, but admitted to being in Ventnor on that date and being inside a residence he should have been in,” McKelvey said.
Before his arrest, Gallagher was working with Hope One, a mobile recovery center run by the Atlantic County sheriff.
He also had been trying to get into treatment, defense attorney Sarah Weinstock said.
“Substance abuse is definitely an issue here,” she said.
Weinstock asked that Gallagher be released so he “can get treatment he clearly needs and, from his nodding his head, what he clearly wants,” she said, as the defendant could be seen agreeing via video from the jail.
If he were being released to a treatment program, that would be different, McKelvey said.
But putting Gallagher out on the street could be a safety issue and a concern for the victim, he added.
“I believe the court and the state have seen far too many times defendants released on the promise of seeking treatment and it just doesn’t work out that way,” McKelvey told the judge.
Judge Bernard DeLury agreed, ordering Gallagher held.
The judge cited “ongoing and drug-related conduct (that) escalated to breaking and entering into residences.”
