Attack Story Phony; Prosecutor Quits

A county prosecutor resigned and checked into a psychiatric hospital Friday after state police determined that he had fabricated a story that two men tried to assassinate him on New Year’s Day.

Camden County Prosecutor Samuel Asbell, who routinely accompanied police officers on drug busts, may face criminal charges after the investigation and a psychiatric evaluation, Atty. Gen. Peter N. Perretti said.

Asbell said Tuesday that gunmen opened fire on him during a high-speed car chase through the streets of Camden and that he was sprayed with glass from his car windows but not seriously injured. He said that he had shot one of his assailants in the head.

Asbell said he believed the attack was related to his tough stance on illegal drugs.

“Thank God I’m alive,” the 46-year-old Asbell had said. “I guess it just wasn’t my day or my time.”

But Perretti said at a news conference Friday that “the event was staged by Prosecutor Asbell, apparently acting alone.”

Perretti said Asbell was questioned Thursday night at the state police barracks in Bellmawr, where he was confronted with details of the state police investigation. Police found that he had shot out his own car windows, Perretti said.

The attorney general would not comment on why Asbell might have staged the shooting.

Asbell’s five-year term as prosecutor had expired, and he was serving as a holdover. It was unclear if he was going to be reappointed by Gov. Thomas H. Kean or Gov.-elect James J. Florio, who takes office on Jan. 16.

Gloucester County Prosecutor Richard Hickey III said he considered Asbell a close friend and that “he loved what he was doing. I really feel for his family right now.”

Asbell had said his Lincoln Town Car was ambushed by two men in a green station wagon at about 5 p.m. Monday after he left his office, where he had gone to catch up on paper work and get his paycheck after a vacation.

When the gunmen opened fire, Asbell said, he fired one round from a 12-gauge sawed-off shotgun that he kept in his car and unloaded seven rounds from a semiautomatic handgun.