East Hampton Village
Nearly $11,000 worth of construction materials — 40 bundles of wood shingles, each one worth $225 — were stolen from an unlocked garage at 32 David’s Lane, police were told on Feb. 8. The site had not been visited since Feb. 1, so the theft may have occurred any time in the following week. Police continue to look for possible footage from neighbors’ security cameras.
Police were summoned to a private parking lot on Race Lane on the morning of Feb. 9 by a 68-year-old East Hampton resident with complaints about abandoned vehicles. He was told that since the lot is private, law enforcement cannot help; the owner would have to call a tow company to remove the vehicles.
Police removed a gray Suzuki Grand Vitara from Main Beach last Thursday morning after its driver, a 20-year-old East Hampton man, got stuck in the sand. There was no damage to the vehicle.
A resident of McGuirk Street called police shortly after sunrise on Saturday to complain about construction noise nearby. Officers spoke with a contractor working in the area, but he was not cited in violation of the village noise ordinance, since the complaint came in after 7 a.m.
A jumpy, out of control, unleashed dog caused a shouting match between two men near Egypt Beach on Sunday. One man, a village resident, was walking on the beach when the dog, owned by another resident, jumped on him. Apparently this was not the first time it had happened. He called police, and told them that the same dog “continuously jumps on him every time he is at the beach and he is tired of it.” The officer advised the two men to stay away from each other, and both left the beach.
Sag Harbor
Gary Rubertone called police on Feb. 7 to say that a construction vehicle was blocking a roadway. Officers found a box truck on a dead-end road making a delivery to a house under construction, and blocking only its driveway. The road itself was clear, they reported, and the delivery man was allowed to continue with his work.
A wire down on Henry Street after school let out on Feb. 7 had Molly Nye worried, but police determined that it was only a cable wire. They removed it, and another resident notified Verizon.
An abandoned Ninevah property had Charles Stevenson concerned about the safety of local kids, who were trespassing there on the morning of Feb. 8. He told police he’d seen them on and off for the past year. An officer found the rear and basement doors opened and damaged. He did not enter the house because of its dilapidated condition, but reported a nearby septic tank “collapsing.” Police are trying to contact the owner so that the property can be secured.
A woman called on Feb. 8 to report a “suspicious” black Cadillac Escalade parked at the dog park, but police found nothing suspicious about it. Nonetheless, the driver agreed to move it.
Miki Herrick arrived home midday on Feb. 8 to find her front and rear doors slightly open. She found that nine pieces of artwork belonging to a former tenant had been removed from the hallway, and called police to report it. An officer determined that it was the tenant who’d removed the artwork.
A squirrel found its way into Janice Moses’s house on the afternoon of Feb. 8, but by the time police arrived, it had found the exit and was back in a tree.
At 2:20 a.m. on Feb. 9, Chelsea Browne found herself without a ride home after the friend who’d driven her into town had too much to drink. She tried local taxi services, also Uber and Lyft, but could not find a ride, and finally called the cops. The responding officer drove her home.
A 95-year-old Ninevah resident was too smart to be taken by a phone scammer on Feb. 9. Twice, the caller, claiming to be from Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes, told her she’d won the big prize and would receive $2.5 billion. Before she could claim it, however, she would have to send $155,000 “for fees and taxes,” the caller said. When the woman declined to pay over the phone, the caller promised to come by the next day to speak with her in person. Police told the woman not to provide any information over the phone, and to call police if any suspicious strangers showed up.
Springs
Another scammer targeted an 80-year-old Springs woman on the afternoon of Feb. 4, impersonating her grandson. He told her he’d been arrested for D.W.I. and needed $9,800 to post bail. He asked her to withdraw money from her bank account, and gave her the name of a “legal aid representative” and a “case number.” A courier service would come by to pick up the money, he said. At that point, she hung up and called East Hampton Town police, who told her to report any suspicious people near her house and to monitor her credit reports for fraudulent activity.