Raul Luna-Perez undergoes a field sobriety test under the overhang at the Red Bank Primary School in March 2025. (Screen grab from police bodycam footage) Click to enlarge.)
By BRIAN DONOHUE
A blood alcohol test taken after the crash showed Luna-Perez’s blood alcohol level at .18, prosecutors, said, more than twice the legal limit.
The case of Luna-Perez, an unauthorized immigrant, briefly became fodder in the national firestorm over immigration enforcement when the Trump administration used the case to underscore its argument for local officials to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement.
Luna Perez’s two previous DWI arrests in Red Bank in the months before the Lakewood crash also highlighted the statewide problem, first revealed by redbankgreen, of thousands of DWI cases being put on hold across the state.
He was arrested again on April 17 of that year at the corner of Tilton Avenue and West Sunset by Officer Grace Maggiuli and charged with driving under the influence. (See bodycam video of the arrest above.)
“Governor Murphy and his sanctuary policies released this serial criminal into New Jersey communities,” U.S. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a press release after the Lakewood crash three months later. “Now, this innocent family is shattered by their failed leadership. President Trump and Secretary Noem will continue to do everything in their power to remove these criminal illegal aliens before they destroy more lives.”
The Murphy administration issued a statement saying they agreed he should have been deported following the previous Red Bank DUI arrests, as well as a previous domestic violence arrest in the borough.
The state’s own policies, federal officials argued, were part of the reason he wasn’t.
Red Bank police operate under the 2018 immigrant trust directive, which limits the types of assistance that New Jersey’s law enforcement officers may provide to federal immigration authorities.
Another largely ignored factor also came into play.
In both Red Bank DWI cases, Luna-Perez had court dates at Red Bank Municipal Court several weeks after his arrest.
And in both cases, instead of having a trial or hearings in which he could have had his license suspended or been ordered to install an ignition interlock device on his car, the case was put on hold, according to both the Red Bank Municipal Court administrator and municipal prosecutor.
The two cases were among what defense attorneys said were thousands of DUI cases stuck in legal limbo across the state while officials determined the reliability of a new a breath analysis device.
RED BANK: FATAL CRASH SUSPECT HAD TWO PRIOR DUIS. HOW WAS HE ALLOWED TO DRIVE?
The statewide moratorium that helped keep Luna-Perez’s two earlier DWI cases unresolved was finally lifted in December — four months after the fatal Lakewood crash — but without the New Jersey Supreme Court ever deciding whether the Alcotest 9510 is scientifically reliable.
But because the case that would have established admissibility was ended without resolution the underlying scientific-reliability question, remains, according to defense lawyers.
“The device is still open to legal challenges,” defense attorney Evan Levov writes in a July 2026 blog posting.
redbankgreen editor Brian Donohue may be reached via email at [email protected] or by calling or texting 848-331-8331.
