Stefan Alexandru Barabas, Home Invasion, Connecticut 2007

A chilling home invasion in South Kent, Connecticut, unfolded on April 15, 2007. Stefan Alexandru Barabas, 38, a citizen of Romania, and his accomplices, Emanuel Nicolescu and Alexandru Lucian Nicolescu, donned masks and brandished knives and fake firearms as they entered a home. The intruders bound and blindfolded two adult victims, injecting each with a substance they claimed was a deadly virus. The victims were ordered to pay $8.5 million or face the consequences of the lethal injection.

As the investigation revealed, the intruders drugged the two residents with a sleeping aid and fled in the homeowner’s Jeep Cherokee. The stolen vehicle was abandoned the next morning at a Home Depot in New Rochelle, New York. An accordion case washed ashore in Jamaica Bay on April 21, 2007, containing a stun gun, a 12-inch knife, a black plastic Airsoft gun, a crowbar, syringes, sleeping pills, latex gloves, and a laminated telephone card with the South Kent address of the victims.

The investigation unraveled when a Connecticut State Police investigator connected a partial Pennsylvania license plate seen near the victims’ estate on the night of the crime to a car owned by Michael N. Kennedy. Kennedy had shared an address with Emanuel Nicolescu, who had been employed by the victim. The investigator discovered that the data for the cell tower near the New Rochelle Home Depot contained a call by a phone number registered to Emanuel Nicolescu, minutes after the Jeep was abandoned.

Barabas, Emanuel Nicolescu, and Alexandru Lucian Nicolescu planned the home invasion, researching and purchasing implements necessary for the crime, including two-way radios, stun guns, and imitation pistols. Kennedy drove them to the location near the South Kent home and picked them up the following morning in New Rochelle. The group fled the U.S. during the investigation, with Emanuel Nicolescu returning in January 2011 and being arrested in Illinois.

Barabas was a fugitive until his arrest in Hungary on August 16, 2022. He has been detained since his arrest. On March 22, 2012, a jury in New Haven found Emanuel Nicolescu guilty of attempted extortion, conspiracy to commit extortion, and possession of a stolen vehicle. Emanuel Nicolescu and Kennedy were charged by indictment in February 2011, while Barabas and Alexandru Nicolescu were charged in November 2012.

Barabas pleaded guilty to conspiracy to interfere with commerce by extortion, an offense carrying a maximum term of imprisonment of 20 years. Under a binding plea agreement, the parties have agreed that a sentence of between 72 months and 84 months of imprisonment is appropriate in this case. Judge Meyer scheduled sentencing for September 11.

Related Federal Cases