Jersey Couple Murdered Right After Engagement Party

Just hours after friends joyfully toasted them at their engagement party, a couple lay dead on a Jersey City street this morning, shot during what police said was a possible carjacking.

College sweethearts Michael Muchioki, 27, and Nia Haqq, 25, had planned to marry next April, those close to them said. On Saturday evening, the couple celebrated their engagement with friends and family at Delta’s, a soul food restaurant in New Brunswick, and then at a larger gathering at Perle, a club and lounge also in the Middlesex County city.

Afterward, a friend said, they begged off going to a diner, opting to return to Muchioki’s Jersey City apartment in Haqq’s Honda CRV. Police said the couple were shot around 3 a.m., a few doors from Muchioki’s home.

Today, as the news spread, their loved ones, shocked and devastated, arrived at Muchioki’s Randolph Avenue home. Many stood outside crying and hugging one another.

“My heart has been ripped out,” said Muchioki’s mother, Sandra Muchioki. “We will celebrate him (Muchioki) for the rest of our lives.”

Hudson County Prosecutor Edward DeFazio said the couple were found dead near Haqq’s vehicle. Each had been shot twice, each once in the head, he said.

Based on the crime scene and witness statements, authorities believe the couple were approached by three carjackers — a man and two women — after they parked, but that an anti-theft device prevented the car from being easily moved, DeFazio said.
He said the carjackers left the scene in a gold Pontiac Grand Am.

“These perpetrators have to be brought to justice,” DeFazio said, “and we are looking for any help that we can get from anyone in the community that may have any information that is relevant to this outrageous homicidal activity.”

Muchioki, who had attended the New Jersey Institute of Technology, left the school before graduation for a job involving computer software, said Kenny Simmons, a close friend. He worked as a software engineer in Jersey City.

Haqq, who has ties to the Trenton area, graduated from the College of New Jersey. She was an associate producer for an affiliate of Nickelodeon in New York, several friends said. Her family could not be reached yesterday.

The couple had met through Greek life at their colleges, and their fraternity brothers and sorority sisters had a strong presence at the celebrations Saturday night and at Muchioki’s home today. Muchioki was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha, and Haqq of Alpha Kappa Alpha.

Friends, who described the couple as popular, positive people without enemies, said they were stunned anyone would harm them.
“Mike always made you laugh and was always smiling,” said Colean Bembry, who attended college with Muchioki. “There are times when I was down and he knew how to pick me up. He knew how to be a friend, and he was just a good person. Nia, the same thing with her. She had the biggest smile ever.”

On Saturday, around 7:30 p.m., about 15 of their nearest and dearest friends indulged in catfish, stuffed pork chops and other offerings at Delta’s. Then, from around 10 p.m. until just before 2 a.m., they danced at Perle.

“It’s almost unreal,” said Holley Murchison, a friend of the couple’s who went to the nightclub. “His friend told me and I’m just like, ‘What?’ You saw them just moments ago, smiling and enjoying themselves. This is like stuff you read about, but it never hits that close to home.”

Everything about them was incongruous with a violent end, said Lance Alexander, an Alpha Phi Alpha member who came to know the couple through the fraternity.

“Their heads were so well together. That’s why this is so hard and heavy on everybody,” he said. “They were not in trouble. They didn’t keep that type of company. To be brutally murdered, it’s absurd.”

Alexander said he arrived at the party late, at about 1:50 a.m. today, just as Muchioki and Haqq were leaving the club. The three, along with many others, stayed outside talking for more than a half hour, he said.

“I said to him, ‘You guys hungry? We’ll go to a diner. He said, ‘No … I’m gonna take it in. We’re gonna go home,” Alexander said. “Then they went home, and this is what happened.”

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