Last week's Star had an account of an East Hampton woman who witnessed a man removing two signs from in front of her Town Lane house on Oct. 16. The man has since been arrested and charged with petty larceny, a misdemeanor. He is Salvatore Ditroia, 67, of Southampton.
According to Detective Sgt. Daniel Toia of the town police, Mr. Ditroia was identified and located by his license plate number, which was caught on the woman's home surveillance footage. On the video, Mr. Ditroia can actually be seen returning the lawn signs — one for the Black Lives Matter movement, and one supporting Joe Biden for president — after the woman accosted him, but Sergeant Toia said he "ultimately made admissions to the crime" when questioned.
Mr. Ditroia was given an appearance ticket and told to be in East Hampton Town Justice Court on Wednesday.
In other arrests last week, Sean M. Bruns, a Southampton interior designer who owns a decorating company called Old Town Crossing, is facing five felony charges stemming from the alleged theft of nearly $490,000 from a Shelter Island woman who hired him in 2017 to design and furnish a house she owns in Florida.
Suffolk District Attorney Timothy D. Sini charged in a news release last Thursday that Mr. Bruns, 43, had forged receipts and invoices to make it appear that the furniture she ordered was on its way. In August 2018, after the woman complained that she had not received any of the items, the D.A.'s office turned up business records that were inconsistent with what Mr. Bruns had sent the client, according to the release. She was able to recoup $104,462 from Mr. Bruns in 2018, but an amount in the hundreds of thousands is still unaccounted for.
The designer is charged with second-degree grand larceny, two counts of possession of a forged instrument, and two counts of falsifying business records. Old Town Crossing is also charged with grand larceny. Mr. Bruns was arraigned in Southampton Town Justice Court last Thursday. He entered a not-guilty plea and is due back in court on Nov. 10.
"There are two sides to every story. Unlike the District Attorney’s Office, we will not be trying this case in the press," said John Kern, Mr. Bruns's attorney, after press time this week. "This is a client-vendor disagreement, nothing more, nothing less. Mr. Bruns and Old Town Crossing are respected, 40-year fixtures of the Southampton Village business, design, and retail community. My client looks forward to resolving this and putting it behind him as soon as is possible."
This story has been updated since it was first published.
