gspfile.jpg

Two boys, both 16, were arrested after they tried to carjack a woman at the Garden State Plaza mall in Paramus Tuesday, police said.

(File photo)

PARAMUS — Two Passaic teens were arrested after they tried to pull a shopper out of her car in a failed carjacking at the Garden State Plaza mall Tuesday afternoon, according to police.

The 34-year-old Ridgefield Park woman told officers she was sitting in her car in the mall’s south parking lot, near Best Buy, when the two boys opened her unlocked door and tried to yank her out shortly before 1 p.m., Police Chief Kenneth Ehrenberg said.

One of the teens grabbed the woman’s car keys out of her hand and she struggled with the pair before they ran away to a nearby residential area in separate directions, the chief said.

A borough police officer, Kurt Massey, caught one of the teens in the backyard of a house on Fairfield Drive, Ehrenberg added. Officers Todd Colaianni and Jonathan Henderson quickly joined in the arrest.

The second would-be carjacker was grabbed in a backyard on Cloverdale Road after Paramus, Maywood and Rochelle Park officers formed a perimeter, according to police.

The boys, both 16, were being held at the Bergen County Juvenile Detention Center in Teterboro on juvenile complaints of carjacking and resisting arrest.

The woman declined medical treatment at the scene, Ehrenberg said.

“The safety and security of our shoppers is paramount and always a priority,” said mall spokeswoman Lisa Herrmann, who declined further comment citing the police investigation.