In shocking photos unexpectedly uncovered by investigators this week, a New Jersey woman and an alleged Bloods gang member allegedly pose with the dismembered body of the woman’s homeowner.
Prosecutors said Wednesday they had discovered shocking photos on the woman’s phone while investigating her for allegedly harboring a fugitive after she harbored a gang leader wanted for shooting and killing his ex-boyfriend.
Images on Elizabeth Mascarelli’s cellphone showed her and suspected killer Maxwell Johnston with “an individual who was obviously deceased, with his upper legs severed and an axe in his chest,” an Ocean County deputy prosecutor said during the 29-year-old woman’s detention hearing.
Mascarelli, who was jailed with Johnston for his role in the hostage situation, is said to have held an axe to the landowner’s chest.
Up until that point, police did not know that the victim, 56-year-old Kelly Rollason, had been murdered.
The crazy images revealed his massacre and the mutilation of his body.
Rollason owned the Toms River home where Mascarelli allegedly hid Johnston, a Bloods member, there for four days before he committed suicide after a seven-hour standoff with police.
Mascarelli and three others are accused of helping Johnston dismember and dispose of Rollason’s body on July 3.
The heartbreaking saga began a week ago when Johnston opened fire on his ex-girlfriend, Gabriella Caloleo, after an argument on a Manchester Township street, according to an arrest affidavit. Retrieved by Toms River Patch.
Caloleo, 25, called police and identified the shooter as Johnston before dying from her injuries. She also texted her mother just before the shooting, saying she was afraid of Johnston and asking her to call police.
Johnston’s parents also contacted police and admitted they believed their gang-affiliated son was responsible for Caloleo’s murder.
He had become “increasingly paranoid” in recent months and had asked the father to help care for his daughter, according to arrest documents.
According to newspaper reports, Mascarelli knew Johnston was involved in the murder of his ex-girlfriend but let him stay at a rental home in Toms River, less than 15 miles from the shooting scene.
Alleged accomplices, Daniel Bolstad, 42, Jared Krysiak, 34, and Jared Palumbo, 36, were inside the home with the couple and heard three gunshots on July 3. They then saw Rollason’s body in the basement, his body having been shot with bullets, according to the affidavit.
Mascarelli and Krysiak allegedly helped Johnston cut the landowner’s body into eight pieces, even spending several minutes posing for disturbing photos with the corpse during the process.
Palumbo allegedly helped the trio load bagged body parts into a Kia Soul, which the trio then dumped several miles away on land in Jackson, where the owner of the property claims to have seen the trio wandering around.
Police tracked Johnston to Mascarelli’s rental home two days later, but the suspect never showed up.
Bolstad, Krysiak and Palumbo fled at the start of a seven-hour standoff with police, but Mascarelli only escaped after Johnston committed suicide.
She was initially only detained on a charge of harboring a fugitive, but the charges were aggravated when officers thoroughly searched her phone and discovered shocking photos this week showing Johnston and Bolstad around a “burning barrel” on the Jackson property.
Bolstad, Krysiak and Palumbo were also arrested on suspicion of involvement in the murder.
It remains a mystery why the five men murdered the homeowner.
In court Wednesday, Mascarelli’s public defender argued that she had a long history of drug abuse and was afraid of Johnston.
