84th Precinct Police Blotter – 11/9/10

By on November 9, 2010 9:51 pm in crime, Police Blotter

bugleblotter-300x1711 Planet Fitness; various assaults on teens; and apparently police don’t like it when you sell untaxed cigarettes. It’s this week’s police blotter.

A strange event occurred at Planet Fitness last Friday morning—a man’s locker was broken into. But that’s not all—if I’m reading the oddly-worded report correctly, the victim then went to his job at Bargain Bazaar on Atlantic Ave., where the very same thief attempted to make a purchase using a fake ID. What went down between the two of them was left out of the report, but it did say the victim confiscated the ID, and that Planet Fitness has ID’d the criminal.

Last Wednesday, a man returned from a vacation to a pile of mail at his home on Cadman Plaza. Included in the mix was evidence that someone had stolen his identity and charged $5,197.17 in his name.

At 1 p.m. last Wednesday on Fulton St., an altercation occurred after an officer attempted to arrest a man for selling untaxed cigarettes. The salesman put up quite a struggle, but was eventually subdued and arrested.

Last Thursday afternoon at the Bergen G stop, a 14-year-old girl was menaced by a 16-year-old straphanger who stole a $300 iPod from her backpack, then cursed and threatened her. He was later arrested.

Finally, around 2 p.m. Saturday on the basketball court on Bridge St., a middle-aged man and his teenage accomplice threatened an 11-year-old with a boxcutter and stole his bicycle. The boy’s father told police that the same duo also stole a bike from his son last month. And that’s this week’s blotter.

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  • John Sean

    Glad to hear Planet Crime is still operating – I’m guessing that no one tries to steal the weights from that gym or are all the machines bolted to floor and there is so such thing as “free-weights” in the gym?

  • bklyn20

    Heather, was there any report of the Sidney Place nanny mugging last week? Since cops were at the scene, I’d think it would have been mentioned on whatever communication you get from the 84th Precinct. I am interested because I live near there and am often on that block, and because I have friends who live on Sidney Place. (Not to mention that mugging a nanny in broad daylight is a pretty brazen act.)

    So, are crimes like this not included in the reports given to you, or do this blog and the local papers see that it happened but decline to report it? Please explain.

  • Heather Quinlan

    There was nothing in this week’s folder. I have asked Crime Analysis why particular incidents haven’t shown up in the past, and I’ve gotten a variety of answers, from “It happened too late in the week to be in this one” to “I don’t know.” I can guarantee, though, that there is no agreement between this blog and the local papers that we won’t report muggings. Lord knows we’ve all reported enough iPhone thefts already.

  • cat

    Heather,

    Any way to dig up info on the nanny mugging? This is the first I’ve heard of it. I also live near there (and the notorious Aitken Place, which will now be even darker and more dangerous with the scaffolding that has gone up at the corner of Aitken and Sidney).

    I feel bad for the kid who has now been robbed twice by the same father/son duo. Sucks.

  • bklyn20

    Heather, I am concerned that the 84th Precinct conceals a number of muggings, robberies and burglaries in our neighborhood for some reason like “the public good” or something similar. Maybe to maintain high real estate values? I also suspect that they do this because of pressure from the local authorities — maybe Borough Hall? Maybe Bloomberg? I can only guess.

    The “Brooklyn Heights Babysnatcher” attempts in the summer of 2002 come to mind. A nanny friend (not the one who was mugged last week) told me about HER friend, who had encountered a strange woman. This somewhat odd-looking lady showed an untoward interest in the child Nanny # 2 cared for. The odd lady (aka The Snatcher) went so far as to try to take the child out of the stroller and hold it in her arms. Sorry to use dismisive euphemisms like “The Snatcher,” but I am trying to keep things cogent.

    After a little investigation, it turned out that local pre-schools knew all about her, and the 84th had had 13 reports about her. 13 reports!!! Then fellow parents told me about the woman’s weird behavior toward their children..

    To cut to the chase, Mary Frost wrote about it in the Bklyn Hts Press, and then Andrea Peyser wrote about it in The NY Post. (She’s not exactly my favorite columnist, but I am grateful to her for this.) Suddenly cops were all over the neighborhood, and the next time the “Baby Snatcher” tried to grab a kid out of a stroller on Montague Street, she was arrested by a cop stationed a block away. She ( the very disturbed woman) went to a mental hospial and hasn’t been seen here since.

    I don’t have an update, but I was appalled that local institutions AND the 84th Precinct knew all about it. Parents of liittle kids — like me — went about their daily business with no idea that a crazy person wanted to take their chldren.

    I consider this to be a condescending “never mind, we know what’s best for you” kind of thing. I don’t fault the 84th for this – but I do want to know who I should fault for it. I think that our neighborhood is really very safe compared to most of NYC, but I want to have the right to decide for myself what risks to take and where. Full knowledge of local crime statistics is the best way for me and my neighbors to do this. How can we get this information?

  • bklyn20

    Last night I wrote a post on the Brooklyn Heights “baby snatcher” incidents of 2002, and how I am concerned that crime information is hidden from neighborhood residents, just as it was when this insane woman tried many times to pull babies out of strollers and take them away with her.

    My point was that we should be able to decide what is safe or unsafe for ourselves, and that in those 2002 incidents police and some in the neighborhood knew all about it, but the general public was not alerted until a major tabloid wrote about it.

    Admittedly it was a long post, as I was striving to support my contention and to give supporting details. Why isn’t it here?
    If it’s not going to go up, please consider leaving this one up to furher the discussion.

  • bklyn20

    Now it is back up — thanks.