Three North Hudson teenagers, two from Union City and one from Weehawken, were arrested last Friday and charged with the brutal stabbing death of 15-year-old Edgar Enrique Nova, Jr., in the Nova family’s Weehawken apartment last month. The boys, a 16-year-old and a 17-year-old from Union City and a 16-year-old from Weehawken, were apprehended Friday and brought into custody after extensive investigation and interrogation led officials to the youngsters. They were brought to the Hudson County Youth House in Secaucus, where they remain in detention. According to Deputy First Assistant Prosecutor Edward DeFazio, the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office will seek to have the three youngsters, whose identities could not be revealed because they are juveniles, treated and eventually tried as adults. “Because of the nature of the crime, their ages and the motive, we will move to have them treated as adults,” DeFazio said. Currently, because the three boys are juveniles, they are not allowed to post any bail. They will remain incarcerated at the Youth House until it is determined by a grand jury whether they will be tried as adults. On Feb. 20, Weehawken police were called to a fourth-floor apartment on Park Avenue, where Edgar Enrique Nova, Sr., the owner of a Ridgefield Park fast food restaurant, found his 15-year-old son in a pool of blood, dead from multiple stab wounds. It was not determined how long the younger Nova had been in the apartment after the stabbing. The elder Nova had not been to the apartment in several days, leaving the teenager without parental supervision for that time. At the time of the discovery, both Weehawken detectives and the Hudson County homicide squad figured that the younger Nova had to have known his assailants. This proved to be the case. “The victim was well-acquainted with at least one of the juveniles arrested,” DeFazio said. “From what we could determine, it had to do with the money that was owed to the victim by one of the juveniles. Robbery was also a motive, because the victim’s wallet was taken from the scene, but it was later discovered.” Added DeFazio, “We then determined that we had to look at associates of the victim, and that’s how we came across the first juvenile, which led to the other two.” A tip led investigators to believe that the murder weapon was dumped over Boulevard East in Weehawken, into the wooded area of the Palisades. However, instead of locating the weapon, officials located the bones and remains of what was believed to be a man who had to have been dead for at least a year. But there is no relation between the Nova murder and the discovery of the human remains. Although the deceased teenager had just moved to Weehawken from Passaic two weeks prior to his gruesome murder, he was a native of North Bergen. Officials believe that the association between Nova and his assailants probably began when he lived in North Bergen. It was not immediately determined whether any of the accused teenagers were high school students. At least one of the two arrested Union City teenagers was believed to attend Emerson High School. It was not known if the Weehawken teenager was enrolled in high school. It was also believed that the Weehawken youngster had just moved into the township after residing in Union City. The murdered teenager had not attended school regularly since last year, when he was a freshman at North Bergen High School. As the case currently stands, all three youths have been charged with first-degree murder. “They’ve all been charged as principals in the case,” DeFazio said. DeFazio believes that the state will rule that the three will be tried as adults. “Usually, because of the nature of the crime, that’s the position of the state,” DeFazio said. “And that’s usually the way the court agrees. The next step will be a referral hearing to determine whether they will be tried as adults.” Until that hearing, the teenagers will remain in the Youth House. The hearing is not expected to take place until the end of April at the earliest. DeFazio applauded the efforts of both the Hudson County Homicide Squad and the Weehawken Police Department for coming to a quick solution of the crime. “We’re gratified,” DeFazio said. “Considering the circumstances that they had to work under, it was an excellent job.”