Cedar Grove Offers Counseling, Support to Mourning Students

More than 40 Cedar Grove High School students gathered in the school’s media center Tuesday to meet with counselors, faculty members, parents, administrators and friends and share stories about a classmate who was killed Monday. 

Brian Topoleski, 18, known as “Topo”, was stabbed in the early morning hours outside a home in Little Falls during a confrontation between two groups of young people. Jonathan Lafontaine, of Totowa, the alleged assailant, faces first-degree murder charges.

Cedar Grove Superintendent of Schools Michael Fetherman was principal of the high school when the Class of 2013 celebrated commencement last month.

Fetherman said, Topoleski excelled in business and planned to enter Montclair State University and pursue a degree in the subject this fall.

“Brian was a gregarious young man who enjoyed spending time with his closest friends and siblings,” Fetherman said.

“Words cannot express the sorrow we feel in our hearts today,” he said. “As a community we shall come together and offer support to Brian's family and friends during their greatest time of need.”

The school district notified parents that grief counselors from the Traumatic Loss Coalition would be on hand in the school’s Media Center Tuesday afternoon.

Parents were also advised that students closest to Brian may need additional intervention to help them process their feelings and emotions.

Some of those close friends were with Topoleski early Monday morning and tried to save his life, according to The Record.

Topoleski’s girlfriend told the newspaper the friends removed their shirts and tried to apply pressure to his chest wounds. Topoleski was taken to St. Joseph’s Regional Medical Center in Paterson where he died.

The teen and his friends had been coming home from an Applebee’s in a Mercedes-Benz around 1 a.m. Monday when a Jeep containing four young people, including Lafontaine, pulled up behind them on Union Boulevard in Little Falls, according to Passaic County Prosecutor Camelia M. Valdes.

The group in the Jeep mistakenly thought they knew the group in the Mercedes, and they had an exchange of words before the Jeep drove off, Valdes said.

The Mercedes reportedly followed the Jeep to a house on Jacobus Avenue where the two groups began to argue. Lafontaine, Valdes said, slipped into the house and retrieved two steak knives.

Lafontaine’s friend, Rilind Hoti, who lives at the Jacobus Avenue home, reportedly tried to stop him. Hoti cut his hand removing one of the two knives from Lafontaine, the prosecutor said.

Back outside, Topoleski and his friends were returning to the Mercedes when the prosecutor said Lafontaine allegedly punched him and stabbed him in the chest.

Visitation for Topoleski will be Thursday, July 18, from 4 to 8 p.m, at Shook’s Cedar Grove Funeral Home, 486 Pompton Ave., in Cedar Grove. A Mass will be held at Saint Catherine of Sienna Church in Cedar Grove on Friday morning at 10 a.m.

Read the full obituary here.