The preppy Princeton murder suspect accused of fratricide ripped out his little brother’s eyeball after beating and slashing him to death in the family’s luxury apartment Saturday night — and police believe he ate it, a law enforcement source told The Post.
Officers also found a bloody knife, fork and plate near victim Joseph Hertgen’s body, the source said — which has led cops to believe accused killer Matthew Hertgen, 31, consumed the missing organ.
Matthew Hertgen also set the family cat on fire during his twisted rampage, sources said — several months after posting a chilling poem to Facebook that included lines about “knives sharpening” and “blood oozing out of his eyes.”
The apocalyptic verses proved eerily prophetic, as police say Hertgen used a blade and a golf club to kill 26-year-old Joseph around 11:15 p.m. Saturday.
Afterward, Hertgen called the cops to report a body and a fire inside the upscale Michelle Mews apartment complex off Witherspoon Street, where units go for up to $2 million.
When officers arrived, they discovered Joseph’s bloody corpse and quickly pinned the crime on his sibling.
They also uncovered the grisly body of the torched cat, sources said.
“It was gruesome,” one police source told The Post. “It was way overboard.”
Another high-ranking Garden State cop said the “brutality of the homicide — and in an Ivy League town — shocked most detectives.”
The ghastly details of Hertgen’s alleged cannibalism are the latest twist in the sorrowful story of an all-American family shattered by unimaginable violence.
“It’s incredibly tragic,” a high-ranking police source said. “Matthew Hertgen came from what appeared to be a perfect, all-American family. No one could have predicted something like this would happen.”
Authorities have charged Hertgen with murder and other offenses, and he faces life in prison if convicted.
Both brothers were high school soccer stars at Toms River North High School and played in college —Matthew at elite Wesleyan University and Joseph at the University of Michigan.
After graduating from Michigan’s business school, Joseph worked as an analyst with Red Bank, NJ-based asset management firm Locust Point Capital, the company website said.
His brother, meanwhile, was arrested for drunk driving in South Jersey in February 2017 and lost his license for three months.
But other than that, he had not crossed paths with the law before the alleged murder.
The three Hertgen boys — Matthew, Joseph and eldest brother David, Jr. — were born into a privileged life built by their mom, Debra, and their father, wealthy tech exec David.
For decades, David has worked at WiLine Networks — a high-tech Princeton firm with annual revenue between $25 million to $100 million — where he currently serves as president and chief financial officer, according to his LinkedIn.
The family originally lived in a $1.1 million home in the Jersey Shore town before moving blocks away from Princeton University.
“The Hertgens are good people,” Joseph Mahon, 50, who coached both brothers at Toms River North High School, told The Post. “His mom and dad are great. They treated me very well.”
“They were great to me and the boys, anything I would ask for them to do, they would do — on and off the field.”
But despite being born on third base, Matthew somehow descended into madness as the years passed — something his warped poetry implied.
“What have you created?/ Why have you created it?/ Who are you trying to strangle?” his sadistic verses read. “And what god are you serving?/ I can see the knives sharpening/ I can hear the arrows whizzing/ I can feel my heart beating/ But can he?”
“Someone sits alone in that room/ That room where the walls shake,” the poem continued. “He still has a pulse/ Blood still flows through his veins/ But something is wrapped around him/ Squeezing him/ Choking him/ Suffocating him.”
“Tightly wound around his head/ Fastened deep in his throat/ Blood oozes out of his eyes,” he continued. “His ears are sparking/ His face vibrates/ He convulses, and he doesn’t stop/ He’s lost/ He’s asleep/ He’s dead.”
In his mugshot, the bearded Hertgen gazed at the camera with deadened eyes and a thousand-yard stare — the same stare he gave his own camera in a selfie taken the night before the gruesome killings.
When asked if anything ever seemed off with Hertgen, his old coach said no — he had lots of friends, worked hard and was a good soccer player himself.
“It’s devastating,” Mahon said. “I just can’t wrap my head around it right now.”
