The question of whether or not the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department will honor requests from United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement to hold prisoners for 48 hours after their scheduled release — to allow ICE agents the time to take them into custody — will likely be answered in the coming days by the Supreme Court of the State of New York’s Appellate Division, Second Department, in Brooklyn. 

The decision will have statewide, and even national, implications. 

These hold requests, commonly called “detainers,” are being challenged by the New York Civil Liberties Union. The lead attorney in the challenge is Jordan Wells. According to Mr. Wells, who filed a brief in early January, when Suffolk County detains someone at the request of ICE, it is, in effect, arresting without a warrant. The N.Y.C.L.U. calls the practice of detaining prisoners on an administrative warrant attached to an ICE detainer request a “warrantless arrest.” 

The appeal started on behalf of Susai Manickam Francis, 55, originally from India, who was living in Northport and was arrested several times last year. On Dec. 11, he pleaded guilty to a disorderly conduct charge in a Suffolk County courtroom in Central Islip, and was sentenced to time served. However, instead of being immediately released, he was taken to county jail in Riverside and held.

The civil liberties union tried to prevent the Suffolk County sheriff’s office from detaining Mr. Francis by filing an appeal. While the court did not act upon Mr. Francis’s case immediately, and he was picked up from county jail by ICE officers, it asked both parties, as well as the attorney general’s offices of the United States and of New York State, to weigh in. Both attorneys general have now filed briefs on the case. The civil liberties union was scheduled to respond Tuesday.

According to the briefs, the Suffolk County sheriff’s office has an “inter-governmental agreement” with ICE to detain those targeted by the federal agency. County Sheriff Errol D. Toulon Jr. said, during a meeting with the press in his Yaphank headquarters on Friday, that the county leases 150 county jail beds to ICE. All of those beds are in the Riverside jail, though the sheriff said that some may be moved to the Yaphank jail. 

Arresting a defendant who otherwise would be released, either after having served a sentence or after posting bail, is described in the court papers. According to the brief submitted on behalf of the sheriff’s office — in the name of then-Sheriff Vincent F. DeMarco, and written by Dennis M. Brown, the Suffolk County attorney — the holds are based on the fact that ICE “has probable cause to believe that the subject is a removable alien.” That probable cause used in each case can vary widely. There might be a court order to deport the individual; or there might be a pending court action to remove them; or fingerprints or other biometrics might throw up a red flag, indicating that he or she either lacks legal status in the country or, if they do have lawful status, are removable for some other reason. Statements made by such individuals to law-enforcement officers can be used against them in their immigration cases, the sheriff’s brief says.

The agreement between the county and ICE requires that “an inmate, against whom a detainer and accompanying administrative warrant has been lodged, is rewritten” — that is, transferred with the necessary paperwork — “from local custody to federal custody. At the time of the rewrite, the inmate is in the custody of ICE. The inmate is then placed into a cell at the correctional facility that is rented by ICE.” All this is done at the Riverside jail by local, not federal, officers.

The N.Y.C.L.U. takes a different view of the matter. According to the brief filed by the civil liberties union on Jan. 5, holding Mr. Francis past his time served sentence was “a warrantless arrest that New York officers have no authority to perform.” The brief states that the warrant used “is not reviewed or signed by a judicial officer,” making it unlawful under state law. 

As of the date the N.Y.C.L.U. brief was filed, the civil liberties union says, Mr. Francis was still being held by ICE. “He has not seen an immigration judge or any neutral judicial officer since he was detained at the courthouse in Central Islip on Dec. 11, 2017, and he does not yet have a date when he is scheduled to be brought to immigration court.” Naomi Dann, a spokesperson for the civil liberties union, said this week that Mr. Francis has still not had a court appearance. 

Despite the fact that Mr. Francis’s case would appear to be moot, since he is already in ICE custody in a facility in Bergen County, N.J., the brief filed by the civil liberties union states that it is “fair to anticipate that in 2018 alone, hundreds of individuals could be affected by a decision in this case.”

Under New York State’s Criminal Procedure Law, the civil liberties union asserts, an arrest warrant is defined as “a process issued by a local criminal court directing a police officer to arrest a defendant, and to bring him before such court.” ICE’s administrative warrant process does not comply with this law, Mr. Wells contends.

Mr. Brown’s brief for the Sheriff’s Department counters that federal law gives ICE a great deal of latitude in how it proceeds. Federal law, he writes, calls on local authorities to cooperate with the process, and that this cooperation has been found to be legal by the United States Supreme Court, so long as that cooperation “is pursuant to a request, approval, or other instruction from the federal government.”

“States retain inherent authority to cooperate with ICE detainers, and it does not, and cannot, show that New York has relinquished that authority,” Mr. Brown writes.

New York State Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman weighed in on Jan. 31, submitting a brief that supports the civil liberties union’s position, according to Mr. Wells. It is the first time that the attorney general has expressed an opinion on the highly consequential issue of ICE detainers.

Crafted by Scott A. Eisman, assistant solicitor general for the state, the attorney general’s brief argues that “New York law forbids arrests based solely on an ICE detainer and accompanying administrative warrant.” Furthermore, it states, “State and local officers lack a statutory or common-law basis to arrest people based solely on administrative immigration warrants.” 

Mr. Eisman also writes that, according to federal law, the Suffolk County attorney’s office is only required to act in cooperation with ICE on occasions when it is “consistent with state and local law.” When local officers detain suspects based solely on a detainer request, he argues, they are violating “federal constitutional protections,” particularly the Fourth Amendment. He writes in his brief that Department of Homeland Security regulations require that cooperating officers — those who execute warrants of arrest on ICE’s administrative immigration violations — must meet specific training standards and hold specific titles: “Nowhere are state or local officials mentioned among the eight categories of officials who are authorized to execute such warrants.” 

Mr. Eisman did find, however, that “if a New York police officer or peace officer has reason to believe that the subject of a detainer has committed a crime, that person may be arrested without a criminal warrant.” 

The federal response came in a brief also filed around Jan. 31, and written by Steven A. Platt, a trial attorney for the United States Department of Justice’s Civil Division. 

The federal position is diametrically opposite to those of the civil liberties union and the state attorney general. “Cooperation with ICE detainers and warrants is consistent with New York statutory law,” Mr. Platt writes, “and even if cooperation with ICE detainers and federal warrants is inconsistent with one New York statute governing arrests, it is nonetheless lawful because it complies with local governments’ residual, common-law police powers.”

“Without such cooperation,” the federal response continues, “removable aliens would be released into local communities, where it is harder and more dangerous for ICE to take custody of them, and where they may commit more crimes.” 

Even if the arrests are warrantless, Mr. Platt argues, “such arrests made in support of federal law enforcement are independently lawful under New York law.”

The decision in State Supreme Court is expected within the next few weeks. In the meantime, immigrants arrested in Suffolk County who otherwise might be released from custody will still be subject to potential 48-hour ICE detainers. Suffolk County Sheriff Errol Toulon Jr. said at a media round table last week that he had no intention of changing his department’s policy and that his officers would continue to hold prisoners at the request of ICE.

The grand jury indictment of Bryan Siranaula, a senior at East Hampton High School, on multiple felony charges of rape and sexual abuse was unsealed in the courtroom of New York Supreme Court Justice Barbara Kahn on Wednesday in Riverside. His attorney, Daniel Rodgers, entered a not-guilty plea on the four felony charges, as well as on the four misdemeanors Mr. Siranaula is facing, which include choking, acting in a manner injurious to a child, false impersonation through electronic media, and assault. 

About 25 friends and relatives of Mr. Siranaula were seated in the courtroom, to show their support for the defendant. Many were fellow East Hampton High School students.

Before the arraignment began, Mr. Rodgers made a request to have probation officers interview Mr. Siranaula, to determine if he was eligible for a monitored release. Mr. Rodgers’s goal was to get the bail reduced from the $205,000 set during Mr. Siranaula’s initial arraignment in East Hampton Town Justice Court on Feb. 5. The probation officer was heard in the courtroom, after conducting the interview with Mr. Siranaula, telling Mr. Rodgers, “You’re good to go.” 

The assistant district attorney, Raphael Pearl, who presented the people’s side of the argument, asked that bail be set at $100,000. 

In her statement to police, the victim, whose name is protected by the court because of the nature of the crimes alleged, told police she had driven to the school to play soccer with a 7-year-old relative. As she drove, she received a text message from a strange number. When she responded, asking who it was that was texting her, the response was the name of a good friend. 

She played soccer with the child, but it started raining, and they returned to the car. At that point, she said, she received another text from the number she now believed to be a friend’s, asking her to wait in the parking lot behind the school. But, instead of her friend’s car pulling up, it was a Nissan sedan belonging to Mr. Siranaula. The two had a prior relationship but were no longer in contact, she told police.

According to Mr. Pearl, Mr. Siranaula’s texts had convinced the alleged victim to wait for him. He then threatened her and pulled her from the car. He then forced her into the Nissan and raped her, Mr. Pearl said. After the rape, the child who accompanied the alleged victim was, he said, seen watching from her vehicle, sobbing. According to the prosecution, Mr. Siranaula allowed her to go back to the car to comfort the child. The woman told police she gave the child a video to watch. Mr. Pearl said that Mr. Siranaula then forced the woman back to his vehicle, and raped her again. 

Mr. Siranaula was charged twice with rape, once with sexual assault, and 

once with aggravated sexual assault, 

all felonies.

Mr. Pearl said there was videotape of the parking lot where the events unfolded — although it was not clear to listeners in the courtroom if the actions of the alleged victim and the accused, in and around their cars, were visible on that tape — and that DNA evidence of the rape was found by police both in the Nissan and on the woman’s body by a nurse who examined her shortly after the alleged attack. Mr. Pearl also said that Mr. Siranaula signed a confession, and that he had composed a letter of apology to the woman.

Mr. Rodgers countered that Mr. Siranaula “is a sworn traffic control officer in East Hampton Village,” and has strong ties to the community. He challenged the people’s portrayal of the events, saying the “victim had numerous opportunities to leave, to drive off, and didn’t.”

Justice Kahn set bail at $50,000, on the condition that the defendant participate in a supervised release, which includes the wearing of a global-positioning bracelet and following strict rules as to where he can and cannot go. She warned that a violation of these terms would result in his being remanded, without the possibility of bail.

The group of supporters stood behind Mr. Rodgers outside the courthouse. He told reporters that he believed his client would be vindicated. He also said that the family would be posting bail, as soon as East Hampton dropped its charges in recognition of the indictment. 

One of those supporters was Erica Siranaula, the defendant’s sister. She had been in the East Hampton courtroom for his initial arraignment. “I’ve been there since the beginning,” she said, “and I will be there in the end.”

The ownership of a small portrait of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis that was painted when she was young is being disputed in a federal lawsuit.

The suit, filed on Feb. 8 in United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn on behalf of Bouvier Beale Jr., alleges that the painting, by Irwin D. Hoffman, which is now at the Terry Wallace Gallery in East Hampton Village, was the property of Edith Bouvier Beale and remains the property of her estate.

Ms. Beale, known as Little Edie, was the subject, along with her mother, Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale, of the 1975 documentary "Grey Gardens." The film focused on the two women, once socialites, living at their dilapidated estate on West End Road in East Hampton Village. Mr. Beale is Little Edie's nephew and the executor of her estate; she died in 2002.

According to the suit, the painting was commissioned by the future first lady's father, John Vernou Bouvier III, in 1950. He gave it to his sister, Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale, before his death in 1957.

The suit claims that the painting was stolen from the Grey Gardens estate sometime in the 1960s or 1970s, and that the theft was never reported because of the combative relationship between the two women and Suffolk County and East Hampton Village officials. The Suffolk Health Department had raided Grey Gardens in 1971 and threatened to evict the two women because of the squalid conditions there, as well as numerous building code violations found by inspectors.

Mr. Wallace's attorney, Todd Wengrovsky, said Monday that the Beales are demanding the painting without showing any proof of their claim of ownership.

"If they walked in here right now and showed me a police report, I would give them the painting," Mr. Wallace, the gallery owner, said on Monday.

Mr. Wallace specializes in the work of East End artists, as well as traditional American paintings, though he does not generally deal in portraiture. He has a huge collection of paintings and rotates them from storage into his gallery. "I would never deal with a stolen painting," he said.

He said that he has consulted with both the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the East Hampton Village Police Department on art forgeries and related criminal behavior in the art world.

Terry Wallace, in his East Hampton gallery, bought the Jacqueline Bouvier painting from a legitimate antiques dealer and says that there is no evidence that it had been stolen from the Beale house on West End Road.

The suit claims that, before her death in 2002, "Little Edie reminded Beale Jr. and his wife, Eva Beale, that various items had been stolen from Grey Gardens over the years, including a portrait of Jackie."

The suit states that Eva Beale saw the painting on display in Mr. Wallace's gallery in 2004 and asked about it. Mr. Wallace told her that he had purchased it some years earlier from a reputable dealer who had since died, according to the suit prepared by Cahill, Cossu, Noh and Robinson of Manhattan.

Mr. Wallace does not recall meeting Eva Beale in 2004, and said it would have been unusual for him to display a portrait in his gallery.

In July 2016, Eva Beale, the suit claims, saw an issue of Hamptons magazine from 1998 in which there was an article on Mr. Wallace and the painting. It was at that point, the suit says, that Eva and Bouvier Beale, who live in Mill Valley, Calif., decided that the painting was the same one that they believe had been stolen from Grey Gardens. The Beales run a lifestyle brand and line of products inspired by the Grey Gardens film and lingering pop culture mystique.

Mr. Beale wrote Mr. Wallace a letter in 2016 describing the painting as "a possibly misappropriated work." Its value, according to the suit, exceeds $75,000.

Mr. Wallace said that he purchased the painting from an antiques store in East Hampton Village around 1988. He said he saw it hanging there during the previous fall and had offered to buy it, along with another painting in the shop, for $1,500. The owner of the store initially refused.

After that, he would return to the shop every few weeks. Eventually the owner relented, and the paintings were then his. Mr. Wallace said that the portrait was on public display in the antiques store for at least six months before he purchased it, which would have been odd if the painting was indeed stolen.

The painting measures 12 by 14 inches. According to AskArt, an online service that catalogs auction prices for art, paintings by Mr. Hoffman, who died in 1989, are of low monetary value. The AskArt database shows 10 examples of his work being auctioned since 2010, fetching prices ranging from $177 to $850. Half of the 10 works did not sell. None featured a celebrity, however.

Mr. Wallace questioned the value put on the painting in the lawsuit, saying that there are two key factors that decide the value of a portrait: the subject and the artist. He agreed that the subject matter, a childlike Jacqueline Bouvier, would certainly boost the work's value. But the artist's poor track record at auction would argue against the $75,000 valuation.

Megan E. Noh, the attorney who is handling the suit, said in an email Monday that "the estate sees this as a matter of principle." She defended the valuation of the portrait, pointing out prices that were obtained in Sotheby's 1996 auction of the Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis estate, in which "even everyday items sold for large sums."

"The market has repeatedly indicated that the association between Jacqueline Bouvier, members of the Kennedy family, and other iconic American figures results in a significant premium above the intrinsic value of such items particularly where, as here, the items come directly from the family," Ms. Noh said.

Mr. Wallace said that the painting is not for sale, and that it is the responsibility of any art dealer to turn over a work that he knows to be stolen. "I would not jeopardize my reputation by handling a stolen work," he said.

A fire that East Hampton Town police are calling "suspicious in nature" destroyed the cab of a 2007 Ford 550 dump truck parked at a house on Neck Path in Springs late Wednesday morning.

The owner, Elaine Daddio, had gone shopping, but left something behind and returned around 11:40 to find the truck in flames, she said Thursday. Ms. Daddio lives at the house, which is owned by Jefferson Eames, and works with Mr. Eames in his tree care business.

Amagansett firefighers responded and extinguished the blaze, but the truck was totaled, Mr. Eames said. It was taken to the East Hampton Town police impound yard to be checked for clues about the cause of the fire.

The Suffolk County police arson squad is investigating along with the town police, who are looking to the public for help. Police have asked anyone with information about the fire to call the detective squad at 631-537-7575.

Ms. Daddio said Thursday that she had been up all night following the incident, frightened that the person or persons responsible for setting the truck on fire might come back.

Mr. Eames returned to Springs in December after serving five months in county jail for five misdemeanors including endangering the welfare of a child, hosting a party at which minors were consuming alcohol, and fleeing a police officer. He claimed on Thursday that his house had been broken into while he was in jail and that numerous items had been stolen. He said he was just starting to get his business back off the ground, and that the fire was a major setback.

A 24-year-old Springs man who was recently released from jail was back in custody this week after being arrested by East Hampton Town police last Thursday night on multiple charges, including assault as a misdemeanor and a felony count of criminal mischief.  

The alleged victim, Samantha Cucunuba, told police that she had been drinking beer and watching television with Christopher Verity when he became agitated about a text message she had received earlier that day. He allegedly picked up a case of beer that still had several bottles in it,  and hurled it at her. When she went to get her cellphone, she realized that it was now in Mr. Verity’s possession, she told police. He allegedly destroyed her phone, leading to the felony charge. 

He then allegedly attacked her. “He slammed her to the ground on her right side,” the police said, fell on top of her, and began biting her repeatedly, first on her face, then on her right arm as she tried to fend him off. He then went out the front door and dialed 911 using his own phone. 

The injuries Ms. Cucunuba sustained that night required a trip to Stony Brook Southampton Hospital for treatment. It was there that she gave her statement to the police. 

When Mr. Verity was questioned, he replied, “Yes, I bit her. Just arrest me now,” police said.

The current charges may spark resentencing — and, potentially, jail time — for a November 2016 felony drunken driving conviction; in that case he pleaded guilty in Superior Court and was allowed to enter a drug treatment program. He was arrested at least four times last year, and has four open cases in East Hampton Town Justice Court, which could result in further additional jail time. He has numerous convictions in East Hampton, including reckless endangerment, resisting arrest, and criminal tampering. 

Because Mr. Verity has been charged with a felony, the district attorney’s office had until the end of the day yesterday to obtain an indictment or release Mr. Verity from custody. According to statements made in court yesterday, he was released.

A Montauk woman who allegedly bound and beat a minor in her care remained in custody yesterday morning, after being arrested Tuesday. Elida Uribe-Benzant, 32, has been charged with assault with intent to cause serious injury as a felony, two misdemeanor counts of acting in a manner injurious to a child, and a misdemeanor count of unlawful imprisonment. According to the police, the assault took place over a three-hour span of time Sunday. 

The alleged victim, a teenager, told police that Ms. Uribe-Benzant was angry about another teen the youth was involved with and began slapping her, before beating her with an extension cord, which she then used to tie her to a chair. Ms. Uribe-Benzant is also alleged to have struck the teen repeatedly with a knife sharpener.

The teen, along with another minor in Ms. Uribe-Benzant’s care, confided to a school counselor on Monday, who in turn contacted the police. 

During Ms. Uribe-Benzant’s arraignment Tuesday, East Hampton Town Justice Steven Tekulsky issued a stay-away order of protection for the minors. He said that the district attorney’s office had asked bail to be set at $50,000. Cynthia Darrell, an attorney from the Legal Aid Society on hand to represent Ms. Uribe-Benzant, in making her argument for a lower bail amount, said that the defendant was a single mother who had given birth when she was only 17 and had raised her family “with no support from the father.” She said that Ms. Uribe-Benzant would fully cooperate with the court and the county’s child protection services, and that a high bail “will only assure her incarceration.”

Justice Tekulsky cited the seriousness of the charges as he set bail at $20,000. If she doesn’t make bail by the end of the day Friday, and the district attorney’s office has not obtained an indictment from a grand jury, Ms. Uribe-Benzant will be released, under state law that covers such circumstances.

An 18-year-old who was a seasonal traffic control officer for the East Hampton Village police is in custody after allegedly raping a woman in a Springs School parking lot on Sunday afternoon. Court records say he lured her there in a text message, pretending to be someone else.

Officials said Bryan Siranaula, a senior at East Hampton High School, had dragged the woman from her car in front of a 7-year-old she had with her.

The Suffolk district attorney's office said on Monday that Mr. Siranaula was aquainted with the woman and planned the attack, posing as a friend and texting her from an unfamiliar number, according to court documents.

In East Hampton Town Justice Court on Monday, Carla Egan, a county prosecutor, said Mr. Siranaula confessed as he was being questioned by detectives on Sunday.

Mr. Siranaula, who lives in Springs, was being held on $205,000 bail after being charged with rape, sexual assault, and endangering the welfare of a minor.

Ms. Egan said Mr. Siranaula "pulled the female victim out of her vehicle, picked her up off the ground, and carried her" to his vehicle, where she was raped. The 7-year-old saw much of the incident, Ms. Egan said, leading to the endangerment charge. "The child was visibly upset and crying," according to Ms. Egan.

According to court records, a member of the woman's family contacted police after the incident. She underwent a physical exam.

Police seized Mr. Siranaula's vehicle and confiscated his clothing to have it tested at the Suffolk County crime lab.

A conviction on a charge of rape in the first degree, which is considered a violent felony, calls for a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in state prison, with a maximum of 25.

Ms. Egan asked that bail be set at $250,000, because of the strength of the case against Mr. Siranaula. Matthew D'Amato, an attorney from Legal Aid who was representing Mr. Siranaula for his arraignment, argued for a much lower amount, pointing out that Mr. Siranaula's father and sister were in the courtroom, that Mr. Siranaula had never been in trouble with the law, and that he has strong ties to the community.

While East Hampton Town Justice Steven Tekulsky acknowledged Mr. D'Amato's arguments, he said that given "the serious nature of the allegations and the statement by the defendant," he was setting bail at $100,000 each for the two felony charges and $5,000 for the misdemeanor charge.

Orders of protection were issued by Justice Tekulsky for the woman, the 7-year-old child, and the woman's family.

Ms. Egan told the court that the case against Mr. Siranaula is in the process of being presented to a grand jury. If bail is not posted by Friday, and Mr. Siranaula is not indicted, he would be released under state law covering bail on felony charges.

A former East Hampton man has been accused by the United States Commodity Futures Commission of defrauding investors by selling shares in a phony virtual-money company. 

The commission filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts against Randall Crater, who, along with his wife, Erica Crater, was evicted from a Diane Drive residence in November, according to East Hampton Town Justice Court records. The businesses’ address was listed as 81 Newtown Lane in East Hampton, the location of a U.P.S. Store where Mr. Crater kept a mailbox. 

The suit charges that Mr. Crater, along with a co-defendant, Mark Gillespie of Hartland, Mich., conned investors by selling shares in a company set up in Las Vegas called My Big Coin Pay. The suit points out that the name of the virtual currency sounds very much like the virtual currency BitCoin, and that investors were defrauded of $6 million by the two accused men. Neither has a license from the futures commission to sell virtual currency, which is regulated by the commission. Of the $6 million the suit says the two took from investors, $5 million of it was from residents of Massachusetts, where the suit was launched in federal court. Mr. Crater is named in the suit as the founder of My Big Coin Pay, while Mr. Gillespie is listed as having solicited sales for the company.

The “defendants also solicited potential M.B.C. customers to invest in M.B.C.P. by purchasing both stock in a company which had merged with M.B.C.P. and alleged licenses related to the medical-marijuana business and marijuana derivative products such as Trokie, a marijuana-based lozenge.” 

On the company’s website, the suit says, the two men promised “that merchants and consumers could process transactions with our new digital currency.” The website gave phony valuations for My Big Coin Pay, the suits says, with the defendants changing the values on a regular basis to make it look like an actual commodity. “The defendants arbitrarily changed the price or value of M.B.C. to make it appear as though it fluctuated in an effort to replicate price changes that might be observed in any other actively traded commodity,” the suit charges. “The increasing prices for M.B.C. on the website and the M.B.C. exchange were illusory and false.” 

The defendants are also alleged to have used various internet tools to deceive their investors. “For example,” the suit says, “the defendants posted a YouTube video in which defendants claimed that M.B.C. was a fully functioning virtual currency that could be used to buy goods and services, and that was actively trading on ‘several currency exchanges’ for dollars, Euros, and more, and stated that M.B.C. was the only virtual currency backed by gold to give prospective customers the illusion that M.B.C. was safe to purchase.” None of this, the suit says, was true.

The YouTube video directed viewers to mybigcoin.com, which was still operational as of yesterday morning, despite the fact that the judge in the case, Rya Zobel of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, issued a restraining order and froze the defendants’ assets on Jan. 16. 

On the home page for mybigcoin.com, viewers are told that “My Big Coin is a cryptocurrency” with which anyone can “buy, sell, stake, receive, trade, shop and donate all around the world and receive 1 percent interest per year!” 

In addition to the false claim that the virtual currency was the only one backed by gold, the suit says, the accused men also made “the representation that M.B.C. had partnered with MasterCard with the promise that M.B.C. could be used anywhere MasterCard was accepted. These representations were false.”

Still listed on the website, as of yesterday, was another grand promise: that My Big Coin would be installing automatic teller machines “in a store near you.”

Another online resource used by the two defendants, the suit alleges, was a press release through a public relations company called Cision. The press release is riddled with grammatical errors and misspellings: It begins, “My Big Coin Inc.’s Co-Founder Randall Crater Announces the Crypto-Currency Exchange Company’s Agreement to have its own Branded Master-Card [sic] attached to its e-wallet.” The release goes on to say that My Big Coin had reached an agreement with a Canadian company, TruCash. That claim was false, as well, according to the suit.

Yet another online resource used, the suit says, was a financial internet chatroom called Raging Bull. “This will go through the roof,” one comment read. “I encourage all to give it a look!”

As noted above, the suit lists Mr. Crater as a co-founder of My Big Coin. His co-founder, according to another lawsuit against Mr. Crater, is Timothy Harrington of Rockaway, N.J., who launched his suit against his former partner in June in the Eastern District of New York Court in Central Islip. Mr. Harrington, in his suit, calls himself an “equal partner” with Mr. Crater and states that while he believed that mybigcoin.com and another company, bluemagicgaming.com, had generated $10 million in profits, he had never seen a penny of that revenue, nor had he ever seen an accounting of the company’s finances. Mr. Harrington’s complaint states that in December of 2013, he paid $50,000 into the Greyshore Website Management Company, based in East Hampton, making him an equal partner.

Mr. Harrington’s suit maintains that Mr. Crater ran the business and kept the books out of an office at 81 Newtown Lane, the U.P.S. Store where Mr. Crater kept a mailbox.

The suit by the U.S. Commodity Futures Commission describes where at least some of the profits went. The suit names three people as relief defendants: Mr. Crater’s sister, Kimberly Renee Benge of State Road, N.C; his mother, Barbara Crater Meeks, of Elkin, N.C., and Erica Crater, his wife. According to the complaint, Erica Crater, between January 2014 and June of last year, bought a house in Florida for $645,000 and spent $339,689 at a jewelry store in Southampton, as well as spending some $517,719 at a Southampton auction house specializing in fine art and antiques. There also was an expenditure by one of the relief defendants of $209,000 at an “East Coast-based marina.”

A hearing was scheduled for Tuesday, when the temporary restraining order against My Big Coin and its operators was due to run out. The futures commission is scheduled to argue that a preliminary injunction against the defendants be issued by the court. However, Ray E.  Chandler, attorney for the defendants, informed the court that he was ill with the flu, and that a substitute attorney was not ready to take the case. The commission objected to this request. The judge agreed to adjourn the case while continuing the temporary restraining order against the defendants, and set a new date for March 15.

At a time when medical coverage has become increasingly complicated and uncertain, one local doctor’s office is making access to care a priority. In the past year, Dr. George Dempsey, a family physician who heads up East Hampton Family Medicine on Pantigo Road in East Hampton, launched an in-home care initiative as part of a larger effort to reach underserved members of the community. 

This service, spearheaded by Diane Schade, a nurse-practitioner, harks back to a bygone era in family medicine, offering house calls to patients who are unable to make it into the office. Ms. Schade, who is trained as an adult geriatric palliative nurse-practitioner, can provide critical medical care all in the comfort of patients’ own homes. Her visits can include physical examinations, laboratory and diagnostic services, treatment and medication management, and palliative care.

This service, which is currently covered under Medicare, is available to anyone who is homebound or for whom getting into the office poses a serious challenge. While at-home treatment options certainly benefit physically handicapped patients, they are not the only group that Ms. Schade sees. Patients may be homebound for a variety of reasons related to age, physical mobility, living conditions, driving ability, psychological state, or recent hospitalization. Anyone who is unable to get into the office qualifies for home care. Approximately 33 percent of Dr. Dempsey’s patients receive Medicare, and a small number of them also qualify for home care. For those who do qualify, the service can be a lifesaver. 

Here on the South Fork, where houses are relatively spread out and public transportation is limited, concerns about access to medical care can be as literal as they are financial. For some, the task of getting into the doctor’s office (which may require a companion, a wheelchair or walker, and a means of transportation) can be onerous, if not prohibitive. Many of the patients Ms. Schade sees at home were once regular patients in Dr. Dempsey’s office, some of whom suffered injuries that impaired their mobility or simply became too sick to leave the house. This left them to rely on emergency services, expensive in-home aides, or to forgo professional medical attention altogether.

In the current health care environment, providers rarely have the resources to follow up with patients stop making appointments. The difficult reality is that patients with critical conditions often end up falling through the cracks. Dr. Dempsey’s new initiative hopes to address that and to ensure a second line of defense against patients being left behind. He is adamant that “Just because they can’t get into the office, doesn’t mean they’re not my patients anymore,” he said.

Beyond the logistics, many providers believe that house calls can have auxiliary benefits on quality of care and doctor-patient relations. In-home treatment presents the opportunity for a more individualized, patient-focused model of care. Under these conditions, patients’ lifestyles and personal priorities can be better taken into account. 

“Seeing someone in their home allows you access to critical firsthand information that you just can’t get in an office,” Ms. Schade said. “For instance, you get to see how [the patients] are living, what they eat, what drugs they’re taking, and better assess what their day-to-day needs are. All of that information is valuable from a clinical perspective and helps me determine the best course of treatment.” 

While other doctors in the area may dedicate a portion of their schedule to in-home visits, so far East Hampton Family Medicine is the first practice here to have one provider devoted exclusively to house calls. “He has always been ahead of the curve,” Ms. Schade says of Dr. Dempsey, whom she met while working to develop the palliative care service at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital. 

Their hope is that this initiative might serve as a model for other providers. With approximately 250,000 Medicare recipients living in Suffolk County, house-call programs would have the potential to benefit thousands of people, if they catch on. Indeed the initiative has gotten the attention of local government officials, who may be interested in expanding on programs like this. 

Dr. Dempsey recently met with East Hampton Village Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., who was impressed with the success of the home-care program. 

Beyond providing house calls, Dr. Dempsey’s office has made several other changes to increase accessibility to care, including launching a comprehensive women’s health care service. Based in the East Hampton office, Julia Chachere, a certified nurse-midwife and women’s health nurse-practitioner, provides well-woman exams, birth control services, and treats gynecological problems. With a large bilingual staff, including Ms. Chachere, the office has also made an effort to ensure that Spanish-speaking patients, an ever growing demographic, feel comfortable. The office also employs two social workers, and a full-time advocate for Medicaid patients to ensure they receive the services they need.

The national health care landscape has seen many shifts over the last year, with providers and patients scrambling to keep up with policy changes. The Trump administration’s recent threats to privatize Medicare have caused widespread uncertainty about coverage. 

Although Ms. Schade is currently the only dedicated home care nurse-practitioner in Suffolk County, she is optimistic that programs like this will catch on. “I’m sure one day all primary care practices will be doing this. It’s health care at its best.”

Over the past eight days, two traffic stops by East Hampton Town police officers that were followed by arrests on charges of unlicensed driving ultimately led to felony drug-possession charges against the drivers involved. Both men have prior felony convictions on their records. 

Michael J. Donelan, 44, of Springs has been charged with multiple drug-possession charges, including two felonies. He was arraigned twice this week by Justice Rana, first on Sunday, then on Monday.

Mr. Donelan turned himself in on Sunday morning to answer a warrant issued by East Hampton Town Justice Court; his first arraignment came soon after. He had failed to pay more than $1,000 in fines from two separate unlicensed-driving convictions. Justice Rana set bail at $250, and warned him that he needed to pay the open fines. Mr. Donelan was released on Sunday morning after he posted bail. 

That night, according to the police, Mr. Donelan was pulled over on Springs-Fireplace Road near Queens Lane in East Hampton for speeding. That stop led to a new misdemeanor charge of unlicensed driving. After placing him under arrest, police searched the vehicle. According to the police report, when they lifted the center console in the 1998 Ford Mr. Donelan was driving, they found 69 small packets of heroin, leading to one felony possession charge, and 11 tablets of methadone, leading to the second felony possession charge. They also said they found five hypodermic needles and a small amount of crack cocaine, leading to two misdemeanor possession charges. 

“So. Mr. Donelan,” Justice Rana said the next morning, Monday, during his second arraignment. “You’ve got some really serious charges now.” She told his attorney, Matthew D’Amato of the Legal Aid Society, that because Mr. Donelan had two prior felony convictions, bail for him could only be set in district court. The law precludes a town justice from setting bail on such occasions. 

Mr. Donelan’s two earlier felony convictions came over a decade ago, and apparently were drug-related. After he was taken to county jail in Riverside on Monday afternoon, Mr. D’Amato petitioned the district court to set bail. He was successful in his effort, but Mr. Donelan was unable to come up with the $7,500 amount that was set, and he remained in custody as of yesterday morning. The district attorney’s office has until Friday to either get an indictment against Mr. Donelan or release him, if he has not made bail by then.

A somewhat similar case unfolded in Montauk last week. According to the police, Pedro Jose Borges, 37, was driving a 2003 Toyota on Montauk’s Main Street the night of Jan. 24 when he failed to dim his headlights for an oncoming patrol car. The officer pulled into the 7-Eleven parking lot behind Mr. Borges, who lives in Montauk, according to the paperwork connected to the case. Initially, Mr. Borges was arrested on a charge of unlicensed driving, a misdemeanor. However, according to police, after the arrest, they found Mr. Borges to be in possession of two small plastic bags containing a white powdery substance, which turned out to be cocaine. The total weight, police said, was over 500 milligrams, raising the possession charge against Mr. Borges to the felony level. 

Mr. Borges was arraigned last Thursday afternoon in East Hampton Town Justice Court in front of Justice Rana. He was also represented by Mr. D’Amato. Mr. D’Amato is assigned by the Legal Aid Society to represent defendants being arraigned on weekdays in East Hampton Town. Justice Rana explored whether or not Mr. Borges was indigent, and therefore eligible for Legal Aid to be permanently assigned to his case. He told the court that he worked as a bartender in Montauk, but that he sends most of his money home to his mother overseas. “We don’t just hand out taxpayers’ dollars for attorneys,” Justice Rana warned. 

Jamie Greenwood from the district attorney’s office asked that bail be set at $10,000. Mr. D’Amato countered by asking that bail be set no higher than $1,500, which his client could make. Justice Rana set bail at $7,000, pointing to Mr. Borges’s record of convictions, which, she said, include a felony in Florida for selling amphetamines. Mr. Borges could not immediately make bail, and was taken to county jail. He was released on Tuesday. 

According to the county jail records office, Mr. Borges was released under the law that requires most defendants being held on felony charges to either be indicted by a grand jury no more than 144 hours after being arrested, or be released from custody.

Representative Lee Zeldin of New York's First Congressional District was not injured on Wednesday when an Amtrak train on which he was traveling to a Republican retreat hit a garbage truck in rural Virginia. One passenger in the truck was killed and two others were injured.

The New York Times reported on Wednesday that Republican lawmakers had chartered the train to transport them from Washington to a resort in West Virginia for the party's policy retreat, which is to conclude on Friday. More than half of the Republican members of the House and Senate were estimated to be aboard the train, along with many of their wives.

"I am okay," Mr. Zeldin said in a statement issued by his communications director on Wednesday afternoon. "It was clear upon impact that something had gone terribly wrong and I am very grateful that the train was able to stop without severely derailing. Fortunately, our amazing first responders, police officers, and medical professionals, without hesitation, leaped into action with the utmost expertise and professionalism to help everyone in need of first aid. I am praying for all those injured in today's accident and their families and loved ones."

Other members of the New York Republican congressional delegation who were aboard the train on Wednesday included Representatives Dan Donovan of Staten Island and John Faso of Kinderhook.