A New Jersey judge on Friday rejected a plea bargain that prosecutors reached with a man accused of trying to lure three young children into a specially rigged van filled with candy.

Under the deal, Brian Warner pleaded guilty in June to possessing a stun gun. In return, charges of child-luring and possession of bomb-making materials were to have been dismissed, and he would have been sentenced only to the time he already served.

Superior Court Judge Wendel E. Daniels did not publicly disclose his reasons for rejecting the deal. He set another hearing for Nov. 3.

It was not clear whether Warner, 49, would seek to rescind the guilty plea in the wake of Friday’s ruling.

Warner stood trial on the charges in 2005, but the jury was deadlocked and a mistrial was declared. He has been free in bail since April 2005, having spent nearly a year in jail while awaiting trial.

Defense attorney Paul Casteleiro called Daniels’ ruling “the wrong decision. They (prosecutors) came to us and wanted to do a plea, and we entered into because it made sense to put this behind him.”

Michael Mohel, a spokesman for the Ocean County prosecutor’s office, did not return a call.

Prosecutors said that in 2004, Warner tried to lure two sisters ages 9 and 10 and their 7-year-old brother into a van equipped with a candy-filled cooler _ and also a police scanner, a cage, black louvers on the windows, sound-muffling padding and sensors to alert occupants if someone was approaching.

Prosecutors claimed Warner had rigged the van to snatch children for sexual assault. But his lawyer argued that Warner had the candy because he has low blood sugar and that he was only trying to be friendly to the children.

The stun gun was found during a police search of the man’s home. Warner’s lawyer didn’t deny it was his but said it was kept in a case and stored in a closet. As for items that prosecutors described as bomb-making materials, the defense said they were things anyone might have in the home.

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Information from: Asbury Park Press, http://www.app.com