Two men who were caught in the act of robbing a Bunns Lane apartment this morning and who shot and wounded a man who caught them with the stolen goods were captured by early afternoon, after an exhaustive search by Woodbridge police and NJ State troopers.

At around 9 am this morning, a woman residing in Woodbridge Gardens, an apartment complex in the Bunns Lane section of the Woodbridge Proper, returned to her apartment with her boyfriend, only to discover that her home had been broke into, said Captain Roy Hoppock of the Woodbridge Police.

The woman's boyfriend saw the suspects, who were hauling the woman's stolen belongings out to a car that belonged to one of the thieves. As the boyfriend approached, one of the suspects opened fire and shot the man several times in the legs. 

Both suspects then fled on foot. 

Hoppock said that NJ State Police were called in, including their tactical squad and K9 units. Helicopters also engaged in the search.

Local schools were put in lockdown mode once word got out that the suspects were at large, said School Superintendent John Crowe. Mawbey St., Ross St., and Matthew Jago elementary schools were involved in the lockdown, as were Woodbridge Middle School on Barron Ave. and Woodbridge Senior High. 

St. James Parochial School, which is only blocks away from the Bunn's Lane incident, engaged in the lockdown procedure as well.

The first suspect fled towards Route 9. The K9 teams, Hoppock said, sniffed the suspect in a nearby dumpster. 

The thief jumped out of the dumpster and was chased down the police dogs, until he was trapped in a gully between the Hess Building on Main St. and the ramp leading from Main St. to Route 9.

Capturing the second suspect took more time.

"We searched for the second suspect. We knew he was still in the area," Hoppock said. "We went house to house, checking sheds and garages."

At 1 pm, police patrol cars still had the area behind St. James cordoned off. Yellow crime scene tape flapped in the wind on Bunns Lane, near the intersection of St. James Ave, where the shooting took place.

With helicopters whirling overhead, Woodbridge patrol cars were blocking off streets in the Grove and Bergen Street area. State police officers in khaki gear and bullet proof vests, and carrying semi-automatic weapons patrolled the streets on foot, looking for the suspect.

Eventually, Hoppock said, they got their man. "The suspect emerged from a house and he was captured. He's now in custody," he said.

Police are still investigating the suspects' identity. Hoppock said that both men are 31 years old and are from Newark.

The shooting victim was taken to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital with non-life threatening wounds.