ROSELLE — The Linden officer in the fatal wrong-way Staten Island crash on March 20 had prior drunk-driving charges in Roselle dismissed because his defense attorney was not given evidence he repeatedly requested, according to an audio-recording of the court proceedings.

The charges, filed against Pedro Abad Jr. after a Jan. 22, 2011 accident in which he crashed through the wall of the Roselle store, were dismissed nearly a year later because the evidence, including State Police reports about blood-alcohol testing and tapes of police transmissions, had not been turned over, as Municipal Court Judge Carl Marshall had ordered.

"This leaves this court no choice but to dismiss this case," Marshall said, according to an audio recording made available to NJ Advance Media of the brief Jan. 19, 2012 municipal court hearing.

The Roselle Municipal Prosecutor had argued against dismissal a month earlier, calling it an "extremely serious case."

In the deadly March 20 wrong-way crash, Abad, 27, was driving north in the southbound lanes of the West Shore Expressway in Staten Island and crashed head-on into a tractor trailer. Two passengers in the car, fellow Linden officer Frank Viggiano and Linden resident Joseph Rodriguez, both 28, were fatally injured. Abad and a third Linden officer, Patrik Kudlac, 28, were both critically injured. They remain in separate Staten Island hospitals.

According to NYPD, the men had left Curves strip club in Staten Island just before the 5 a.m. accident. It is still unclear if Abad had been drinking that night, but the NYPD said they have obtained a warrant to test his blood for alcohol.

Abad has been charged with drunk driving in two separate incidents over the last four years and was captured on a police dash camera unable to complete a sobriety test in 2013.

The Feb. 26, 2013 charges resulted in his license being suspended. His license was restored in May 2014, and he then was required to drive with an ignition-interlock device on his car until September of that year, according to state records.

In the Jan. 22, 2011 crash, Abad was driving south on St. George Avenue when his 2010 Audi A5 went off the road at Rivington Avenue and crashed through the wall of the New Way Supermarket, according to Roselle police reports. A Roselle officer and firefighter reported smelling alcohol emanating from Abad. He was taken to University Hospital where he was treated for injuries.

Abad's blood-alcohol content after the Roselle accident was 0.176, more than double the .08 level considered legally intoxicated, according to an analysis from the New Jersey State Police Office of Forensic Sciences in Sea Girt.

Less than a week after the accident, Abad's attorney, Greggory Marootian, filed a list of requests for evidence, including the kit used to take a blood sample from his client, a copy of the manual outlining the procedures used to analyze the blood, and 12 months of reports on the servicing of the machine in the State Police laboratory used to conduct the analysis, according to a recording from Roselle municipal court.

Marootian also requested audio recordings of police transmissions from the night of the accident.

The Livingston attorney, who specializes in drunk-driving cases, filed a motion to suppress results of the blood sample testing, five months later, arguing that police never got a warrant to obtain the sample from Abad while he was in the hospital following the accident. Roselle police have said that in 2011, officers were not required to obtain a warrant when they believed they had probable cause to test for drunk driving.

In August 2011, seven months after the accident Marshall issued a order giving police 30 days to provide Marootian with the evidence he requested.

According to the audio recording of a court hearing on Dec. 15, 2011, State Police provided six months of reports about the analysis machine, indicating that is all they normally supply. Also the State Police provided two non-consecutive pages of standard procedures, but Marootian argued to the judge that several pages were not turned over.

Marootian said he also had not received the audio recordings of police transmissions.

In that hearing, Marootian complained to the judge about the delays in receiving the information.

"They're making us jump through hoops. I think it's offensive. I think it's arrogant," Marootian said.

The judge, noting the case had dragged on nearly a year said he would give police one more month to provide the information and if it was not supplied, he would consider a defense motion to dismiss the case.

Municipal Prosecutor Steven Merman quickly argued against a dismissal, stating that Marootian had only requested the blood evidence be suppressed.

"This is an extremely serious case," Merman said at the Dec. 15, 2011.

He noted that Roselle Police Officer Kendall Vaughn, who investigated the accident, had been out sick for a long time and that he had no control over the information that State Police supplied.

The next month, at a Jan. 19, 2012 hearing that lasted three minutes, Marshall dismissed the charges against Abad. Marshall said he had originally given authorities until Sept. 30, 2011 to supply information to Marootian, and he had yet to receive it more than three months after that deadline.

Marootian and Merman, when contacted for comment about the case last week, each declined to comment. Marshall did not return a call to his office.

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Tom Haydon may be reached at thaydon@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @Tom_HaydonSL. Find NJ.com on Facebook.