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NJ Teen Fatally Stabbed by Son of Former Top Aide in de Blasio Administration: Officials

A teenager was stabbed to death in a northern New Jersey street Monday morning when he tried to rob the son of a former top aide in New York Mayor Bill de Blasio's administration, officials say. 

The killed teen, Savion Lewallen, was among a group of  five people who tried to rob 19-year-old Khari Noerdlinger near his Edgewater, New Jersey home, according to prosecutors. Noerdlinger is the son of Rachel Noerdlinger, former chief of staff to First Lady Chirlane McCray, the Edgewater mayor told NBC 4 New York. 

Noerdlinger fought back and stabbed Lewallen in the leg, then tried to remove evidence from the scene along with the others, officials said.

Lewallen was taken to Palisades General Hospital, where he died of a stab wound to his right thigh, prosecutors said.

Khari Noerdlinger was arrested Monday on charges of aggravated manslaughter, weapon possession and hindering apprehension. He's been remanded to Bergen County Jail on $500,000 bail, prosecutors said.

Attorney information wasn't immediately clear. A message left with his mother wasn't immediately returned. 

De Blasio and McCray said in a statement emailed to NBC 4: "Our thoughts and prayers are with the family that has lost their son, and with everyone affected by this tragedy." 

Lewallen is from Spring Valley and was recently released from Rockland County Jail for allegedly holding and assaulting a 15-year-old girl for 90 minutes in the woods near Spring Valley High School against her will, The Journal News reports.  

The four other people with Lewallen were charged in the robbery attempt, prosecutors said. 

Khari's mother, Rachel Noerdlinger, left the de Blasio administration in November 2014 amid scrutiny over her personal life. An official probe found she committed no wrongdoing by failing to disclose her live-in relationship with a man who has been arrested at least five times and convicted in a 1993 fatal shooting of a teenager over a jacket. 

But after her son was arrested on a criminal trespass charge in Washington Heights in November 2014, Noerdlinger decided to leave her post. 

She said in a statement at the time that her son's arrest "heightens the need for me to devote my full attention to Khari, my number one priority."

"I can handle criticism and scrutiny of me, even when it's mean-spirited -- that comes with the territory when you take on the status quo," Noerdlinger said at the time. "But increasingly, my son has been subjected to attacks that have nothing to do with the public interest, and everything to do with derailing this administration. I do not want to be a distraction -- the work at hand is far too urgent."

Three others youths were arrested along with Khari at that time, and two of them were allegedly found with marijuana. Khari was not one of them.

The case Monday is being investigated by the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office. 

Detectives could be seen at the scene near Old River Road at about noon. The roadway in front of a pizzeria was cordoned off. There was what appeared to be a bloodstain in the street.

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