For the last four months, Guttenberg police had been on the lookout for a graffiti artist who had been leaving his mark or “tag” all over town. In at least 20 visible places, the gray spray-painted signature of “ITK” for “Impossible to Katch,” and another one, “Phame,” were found – on the outside of the town community center, on the front door of the volunteer fire department, outside businesses and on public edifices.
Last week, Guttenberg police finally captured a suspect. While responding to a call regarding a possible stolen car located in the parking garage of the Garden Apartments complex on 71st Street, police noticed a door sitting in the building’s Dumpster that featured many of the wanted graffiti artist’s tags.
“The door looked like it was taken off a closet in the building,” said Lt. Joseph Gryzbowski. “And the door featured ‘ITK’ and ‘Phame’ on it.”
According to Gryzbowski, the police officers then asked the building’s superintendent where the door came from. The door had been removed from an apartment where 20-year-old Marcus Punjabi resided.
“When the police officers went to the apartment to question Mr. Punjabi, they noticed 16 cans of spray paint easily in sight,” Gryzbowski said. “He gave them permission to come into the apartment and they searched the apartment. They found paraphernalia and notebooks that featured the tags, like he was practicing the tags in the notebooks and art books.”
According to Gryzbowski, Punjabi then admitted to the police that he was the one behind the rash of graffiti.
However, police officers say they also located something even more interesting – 31 bags of marijuana.
In addition to the 20 counts of defacing public property and criminal mischief he was to receive for his spray-painting exploits, Punjabi also received possession of a controlled dangerous substance (marijuana), possession within 1,000 feet of a school, possession within 500 feet of a housing project, and intent to distribute.
He was transported to police headquarters and held in lieu of $5,000 cash bail, which an unnamed relative paid to have Punjabi released.
Punjabi is awaiting a court date at Hudson County Superior Court.
“With that much marijuana, he had to be dealing it some place,” Gryzbowski alleged. “This wasn’t for recreational use. It turned out to be a good arrest and good thinking by our officers. They made a good observance, seeing the markings on the door, realized they probably had the same person who did all that damage around town.”
Gryzbowski said that Punjabi admitted to doing the graffiti, but gave police no reason for the rash of paintings. “The investigation had been going on for a couple of months,” Gryzbowski said. “He was hitting us all over town. People would paint over their doors and he would do it again at various locations around town.”
In any case, Guttenberg Mayor David Delle Donna is glad that a suspect has been apprehended.
“We are very happy we caught the individual responsible for doing this,” Delle Donna said. “For the last few months, we have seen a lot of graffiti on buildings, and now that we caught the person we think is responsible, we hope we can get back to normal.”