Box cutters, guns, and the Jersey salute: NJ road rage is out of control

I was in my 20s. Not my proudest moment.

I was driving with my wife and a friend who had a heart condition when I got stuck behind someone blocking the road. I did what seemed, in that particular moment of brilliant decision-making, like a completely reasonable thing. I flattened my middle finger against the passenger window as I drove past.

The guy came out of his truck. Kicked mine. Then got back in and started chasing me.

My friend with the heart condition was saying "drive drive drive" and I drove -- fast -- zigzagging through neighborhood streets until I lost him. My wife was somewhere between genuinely alarmed and, I have to admit, a little bit thrilled by the adventure. Our friend with the heart condition was neither.

That was then. These days I know better. These days I assume everyone on the road potentially has a gun. I use the yoga breathing my wife taught me. I think about Frank Costanza screaming "Serenity now!" in that Seinfeld episode. And mostly I just let it go -- because the alternative, as the news keeps reminding us, can be catastrophic.

When road rage becomes something else entirely

On March 26, a man in Old Bridge got into a dispute with another driver on Route 516. He pursued the other car eastbound from Ridge Road to Bushnell Road in a dark pickup truck. Then he pulled out a gun and pointed it at the people in the other vehicle. Old Bridge police are still looking for him.

In February, a 51-year-old Linden man named Alberto Balcazer was working as a rideshare driver in Secaucus when he pulled his car in front of another vehicle and stopped. The two exchanged words. Balcazer then pulled out a .50 caliber Desert Eagle Magnum and pointed it at the other driver before fleeing. Police found him, along with the gun and hollow point ammunition, at his home. He is facing aggravated assault, weapons charges and terroristic threats.

And in September 2025, near Stockton University in Galloway Township -- South Jersey, our backyard -- a 46-year-old man named Ernest Heinz tried to ram another car twice, then followed it to a red light. When the woman behind the wheel, Maritza Arias-Galva, told him she was not speeding, he pulled a gun out his window and fired. The bullet hit her in the face. She stayed conscious long enough to describe her attacker to police, bleeding, while her youngest child needed someone to meet her at the school bus stop. Heinz was a minor actor with credits that included The Sopranos. He was arrested hours later.

A merge. A red light. A woman shot in the face.

SEE ALSO: New Jersey's most peaceful drives — no road rage, no tolls, all soul 

What your fellow New Jersey drivers told us today

On today's Judi and EJ Show, Kyle Forcini and I spent an hour on road rage and the calls never stopped. Here is what New Jersey told us.

One listener accidentally cut someone off -- genuinely not being a jerk, just made a mistake. The other driver turned his SUV sideways to block the road. Then he and his mother both got out in a threatening manner. The listener called 911 while they could see him doing it. The mother and son watched him make the call and drove away.

Another caller made an unintentional mistake. Two men got out of their car and came at him with box cutters.

Box cutters. For a driving mistake.

Serenity now -- and mean it

Here is what I have learned. New Jersey roads are genuinely stressful. The density, the traffic, the merges, the people who made a simple honest mistake and are already sorry about it -- it all adds up. People make mistakes behind the wheel every day. Most of them are not trying to ruin your life. They are just trying to get somewhere.

The person who cut you off might be rushing to a hospital. The person who took your parking spot might be having the worst day of their life. Or they might just not have seen you. It is almost never personal. It just feels that way.

And the one time in a thousand when it actually is personal -- when the person behind the aggression is genuinely dangerous -- the only winning move is to not play. Let them go. Call 911. Drive away. Do not flatten your finger against the window like I did in my 20s.

The yoga breathing works. Serenity now actually works if you mean it. And keeping your hands on the wheel and your phone on 911 is the most New Jersey thing you can do in 2026.