NJ reopens investigation into mysterious deaths of former Republican politico and wife
State authorities have reopened their investigation into the 2014 deaths of a former state transportation commissioner and his wife, the New Jersey Attorney General's Office said Tuesday.
For years, authorities have said former Commissioner John Sheridan, 72, fatally stabbed his wife, Joyce, set their Montgomery Township home ablaze and took his own life. The Sheridans' four sons never believed that, and they repeatedly pushed to reopen the case.
On Tuesday, they got their wish.
"Our office is investigating this matter, and we will follow the evidence wherever it leads," said Steven Barnes, a spokesman for acting Attorney General Matthew Platkin.
Barnes declined to give further information, such as what prompted Platkin to renew the inquiry.
The attorney general's decision, first reported by WNYC, will breathe new life into the dormant mystery of who killed the Sheridans on Sept. 28, 2014. Was it actually a murder-suicide, as the Somerset County Prosecutor's Office ruled? Or was there more to it?
One of the couple's sons, Mark Sheridan, has always rejected the conclusion of the Prosecutor's Office. In January, he asked the state Attorney General's Office to consider reopening the investigation because of another bizarre case: the 2014 murder-for-hire plot that led to the death of Michael Galdieri of Jersey City under suspiciously similar circumstances.
One of Galdieri's confessed killers, George Bratsenis of Connecticut, said in federal court that he stabbed Galdieri to death in Galdieri's apartment in May 2014 and set the place ablaze. Then he met the plot's mastermind, former Democratic political operative Sean Caddle, at an Elizabeth diner to arrange for payment.
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Connecticut police arrested Bratsenis about four months later on unrelated charges. When authorities searched Bratsenis' Chevy pickup truck, they found in his possession a long-bladed kitchen knife, news reports said.
In Sheridan's letter to the attorney general, he said authorities never recovered the blade that killed his father. And the description of the knife police found in Bratsenis' truck on Sept. 30, 2014 — just two days after John and Joyce Sheridan died — matched the description of a piece missing from a knife block in his parents' home.
"I ask that you reach out to [federal authorities] to request photos of the knife recovered at the time of [Bratsenis'] arrest to determine if it matches the set of knives from my parents' kitchen," Sheridan wrote. "Perhaps, if you are so inclined, you might even ask for a DNA sample from the knife to see if there is a match for either of my parents' DNA or the unexplained male DNA referenced in the State Police report related to my parents' deaths."
Sheridan did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.
WNYC revisited the deaths in a recent podcast called "Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder Mystery." The podcast details many questions raised about the initial investigation and John Sheridan's ties to New Jersey politics, according to an article in Gothamist, a WNYC-owned news outlet.
Shock to state's political class
The shock of the Sheridans' deaths eight years ago rippled through the state's political class.
When he died, John Sheridan was the president and chief executive officer of Camden-based Cooper Health System. Before that, he was a high-profile Republican politico who served in several administrations, including as commissioner of the Department of Transportation during Tom Kean Sr.’s administration.
Four governors and scores of mourners turned out to honor the couple during an October 2014 memorial service inside the Trenton War Memorial.
Then-Gov. Chris Christie said John Sheridan, who served on his transition team, was a man he relied on for advice about both politics and policy.
"He was a real zealous advocate for the positions that he felt were important," Christie said at the time. "He had great passion for everything that he pursued in his life."
Former Gov. Christie Whitman called Sheridan "a fixture" in New Jersey government and said he was an "indispensable adviser to me from Day One."
"John always had a calming effect in even the most challenging of situations," Whitman said after his death. "You could count on him."
But despite his long shadow, authorities made little progress in the investigation after deeming it a murder-suicide.
Mark Sheridan, an attorney with an international law firm, said county and state authorities laughed off his family's suggestions that the deaths were anything else.
“Indeed, both offices openly mocked the idea of a killing for hire involving a stabbing with a fire set to destroy evidence,” Sheridan wrote.
But in a victory for the family, the state medical examiner in 2017 changed John Sheridan's cause of death from "suicide" to "undetermined" after an independent autopsy and an administrative appeal to the appellate court.
At the time, Sheridan said he felt a "huge wrong has been made right, at least in part."
But they still had a long way to go, he added.
Steve Janoski covers law enforcement for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news about those who safeguard your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.
Email: janoski@northjersey.com
Twitter: @stevejanoski
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: NJ reopens investigation into deaths of John and Joyce Sheridan
