Defendant pleads guilty to grisly Little Ferry stabbing in 2021. Here are the details
The man accused of fatally stabbing a Little Ferry man in his own home in 2021 faces up to 22 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge on Wednesday.
Ray Edwardo Arcentales Sanchez appeared before state Superior Court Judge Frances McGrogan in Hackensack to plead guilty to aggravated manslaughter rather than murder. He has been housed in the Bergen County Jail since his arrest.
Arcentales Sanchez drunkenly stabbed Yuryin Herrera in his home after a night of drinking among co-workers. Herrera was found with a gaping chest wound when police were called to the home on Oct. 28, 2021. An 8-inch kitchen knife covered in blood was found in a nearby garbage can.
The Jersey City man told the court he got into a dispute with Herrera and went back into the room to confront him. He had a broken bottle and the knife, with which he stabbed the man more than once, even while he was on the ground. He said Herrera had slapped him in the face and insulted him.
The plea almost didn't happen, because there was some confusion during Arcentales Sanchez's testimony.
When Prosecutor Anthony Talarico asked Arcentales Sanchez if he knew what he was doing when he stabbed Herrera, the man said several times that he was drunk. McGrogan jumped in and said Arcentales Sanchez kept backpedaling by saying he was drunk and that he didn't have to enter a plea if he didn't want to.
Arcentales Sanchez's attorney, Nathan Kittner, took a minute with him, and when the court was back on the record, he told McGrogan that his client had been confused when Talarico asked him about waiving his right to affirmative defenses. Kittner said he was comfortable with the court asking Arcentales Sanchez his specific recollections of the night of the stabbing.
McGrogan took over questioning and accepted Arcentales Sanchez's guilty plea before scheduling sentencing for April 28.
Herrera's killing accentuated a particularly violent stretch in Bergen County in the fall of 2021. His death was the third homicide of the week in Bergen and the fourth in two weeks.
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Little Ferry NJ homicide in 2021 leads to guilty plea
