Ex-music executive pleads to Parsippany bank heist

A former music recording engineer from Brooklyn, N.Y. pleaded guilty Tuesday to robbing a PNC Bank in Parsippany in 2012 by handing a teller a note that advised handing over money “for your safety and everyone else’s.”

Stephen L. Smith, 32, admitted to one count of robbery on Sept. 5, 2012, at the PNC Bank, telling Superior Court Judge N. Peter Conforti in Morristown that he understood his note put the teller in fear of bodily injury.

In exchange for his plea, Morris County Assistant Prosecutor Joseph Napurano has recommended that Smith be sentenced on Feb. 27 to seven years in prison, with 85 percent of the term to be served before parole consideration.

Authorities said that Smith, who was employed at the time of his arrest with the gospel division of Sony Music Entertainment in New York City, fled the PNC on Route 46 West with $4,410.

After the heist, a quick broadcast of the suspect's description and the 2005 black Audi A6 he was driving went out, and Secaucus police stopped Smith on Route 3 shortly after the robbery.

Defense lawyer Jessica Moses said that Smith still faces a pending bank robbery charge in Little Falls. He was accused of robbing a TD Bank on Main Street and Paterson Avenue in Little Falls a few days before he held up the PNC. He allegedly netted just $795 in the TD robbery.

Moses said the Passaic County plea offer is for 10 years and she expects her client to resolve that case and be sentenced on both cases to terms that will run concurrently instead of consecutively to the other. A conference on that case is slated for mid-January. If Smith accepts a plea offer in Passaic County, he would be sentenced in either Morris or Passaic on both robberies at the same time.

Jazzy Jordan, Smith’s supervisor at Sony, said at the time of his arrest that “He had a great job. I’m totally baffled by this.”

Smith in court on Tuesday did not provide an explanation for the crime.

Peggy Wright: 973-267-1142; pwright@njpressmedia.com