Mad Soda Can Bomber at Clark Street Dorm?

By on April 22, 2011 1:03 pm in crime

A reader alerted us to this disturbing message on the Yahoo Brooklyn Heights Parents page:

This evening at 8:30pm my husband was walking on the sidewalk in front of the dormitory at 55 Clark Street and an extra-large, full can of soda fell to the ground almost hitting him on the head. It missed him by only 4 or 5 inches.
The doorman working at the building across the street said that this is a recurring problem since, apparently,there is a resident (a student?) who has been throwing/dropping soda cans out of the window attempting to hit people. My husband called the police, but when they came they said they could do nothing about it since it was not clear from exactly which room the can was thrown, and also because no one was hurt. I intend to call the precinct tomorrow to report this again, but in the meanwhile I wanted to write to warn everyone to please, please avoid walking on the side of Clark street under the dormitory, especially in the evening and especially with your children. The can was most certainly thrown from at least several stories up and could do serious damage if it were to hit a person or young child.

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  • weegee

    Because I believe everything has a relevant parallel in history (and local media): http://www.marchermann.com/1961hsg.jpg

    And, in 1962, this sign appeared on the St. George’s rooftop: http://www.marchermann.com/railing.jpg

  • WillowtownCop

    @ Serpico-

    If you’re so intent on something being done please explain exactly what you think they should do. Keeping in mind they need a warrant to break down doors, some way of proving the object was thrown intentionally, and some way of proving who threw it.

  • Serpico

    I think I’ve explained that already. why didn’t they question the residents in the dorm? it doesn’t require a warrant to go around knocking on doors and ask questions. Even if it didn’t turn up any hard evidence it would have at least sent a clear message that the incident is no joke and the police are taking it seriously. That may have been enough to get the idiot to stop. But of course that would have required a lot of walking (it’s a big building) and actually doing some work.

  • epc

    Wow.

    I’m neither a cop nor a constitutional lawyer, but that would be an incredibly naive waste of time and limited NYPD resources.

  • Linda

    Educational Housing Services has a website. The names of the
    Residence Directors at the St. George Clark St. Residence are on the website. They should be aware of what’s happening at their residence hall. If not, someone should tell them and direct them to this website.
    http://www.studenthousing.org/student-life/staff

  • WillowtownCop

    I don’t think you’re grasping the fact that there isn’t any way to prove that anything other than an accident took place.

    Spending 4 hours warning people that a misdemeanor may or may not have taken place that there’s no way to prove its really stupid.

    If there had been a felony assault in the building where someone actually got hurt they would maybe put up posters looking for info, or ask people on the floor where it happened.

    How would you like to be one of the other four jobs they were holding while they conducted their useless empty threat campaign?

    Either the police are useless donut eating pigs or they’re magical and can instantly fix all problems no matter how long they’ve been festering- pick one; you can’t have it both ways.

  • http://inklake.typepad.com Peter Kaufman

    I’ve seen things and/or water mysteriously drop from the St. George on the Clark Street side. More than once.

  • bklyn20

    I understand and respect Willowtown Cop’s opinions, but if security camera footage is available and shows repeated “throws” from specific windows, can’t something be done about it? Could it just be a question of enforcement by school authorities and/or landlords? Maybe we need Clark Street Window CompStat.

  • Duncan B. Glazed

    What if they were throwing doughnuts out the window instead of soda cans?

  • weegee

    Unless they have a line-of-sight deal with 101 Clark, I doubt there’s a security camera that covers the entire 12 story x 18 window facade (and that’s just the Henry Street side)…isn’t pinpointing a window of origin easier said than done?

  • tb

    There are several windows that are constantly open with crap sitting on the ledge. Perhaps this is something that can be addressed by the owners. Also… Screens???

  • GHB

    I understand Willowtown Cop’s words, but what if someone got clocked by one of those cans?

  • AmyinBH

    How is throwing a full can of soda out a window with the intent to hurt someone entertaining? I don’t often walk past this building and now I am even less inclined to do so.
    And, in the immortal words of all the old people who came before me: “These kids today have no respect and behave like animals.”

  • Eddy de Lectron

    “The George” A long history of falling objects indeed: Back in the late 70’S, one of the older guys in the hood was legendary for throwing a fire axe off the roof that embedded in the hood of a car. Then there were the jumpers. When the hotel was a SRO, some of the residents who “had enough” decided to self-defenestrate resulting in several sensational “splats”, including one who fell through the skylight in the arcade (now covered) and landed atop the token booth.

  • nabeguy

    In walking byy and looking up at the facade on the Clark Street side this morning, I saw at least one can on a window sill. Couldn’t tell if it was full or empty but it was a tall-boy 20 oz sixe. Definitely could do some noggin damage.

  • Serpico

    WillowtownCop proved my point, The police do nothing to prevent crime. They are only around to ‘clean up the mess’ after something happens.

  • David on Middagh

    @Serpico: You just reminded me of “Minority Report”, the flick, the Philip K. Dick story. Maybe, instead of psychic precogs floating in isolation tanks, we’ll have psychological profiles for all on file, and everyone’s current whereabouts trackable by implanted chips. Then we can match the most likely perp to the offense before interviewing anyone!

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