Police & Courts

Smoke was reported across the East End on Saturday morning, when residents awoke to the distinct smell of something burning. According to meteorologists with Environment Canada, the smoke is from a wildfire in the Province of Nova Scotia, where some 23,000 hectares of woodland (around 57,000 acres) have been burning in an out-of-control fire that started last weekend.

A Water Mill man was charged with felony driving while intoxicated Sunday afternoon. Police said his 5-year-old niece was asleep in the back seat of the car at the time of the traffic stop.

Late Saturday night or early Sunday, at a house on Clinton Street in Springs, vandals spray-painted the front door, a mailbox, and multiple cars with pink paint. A resident reported hearing “loud exhaust, possibly a dirt bike” around midnight.

What was reported to police dispatchers as a "smoldering battery" in a battery substation in East Hampton early Wednesday morning resulted in road closures and halted train service.

About 70 firefighters from seven departments battled a massive house fire on Sunday afternoon at 38 Farmstead Lane in Water Mill. One firefighter was treated at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital for heat exhaustion, and was released a short while later.

Maison Close Montauk on East Lake Drive, which had a grand-opening celebration planned this weekend, was completely ravaged by flames.

A Riverhead man is facing drunken driving charges for the third time in 10 years, making his latest charge, levied by East Hampton Town police on May 7, a felony.

The fire marshal was summoned on the morning of May 16 when a 35-year-old woman got stuck in the elevator at a commercial building on Newtown Lane in East Hampton Village. No problem. He turned the system off, then switched it on again. The elevator sprang to life, and the woman was able to exit safely.

East Hampton Town and Village police reported three accidents involving injuries this week.

For the first time in over three years, Sag Harbor Village police assisted the State Police Department’s commercial vehicle enforcement unit with an inspection checkpoint in the village.

Note to whoever has been dumping bags of fish carcasses into the Montauk Manor’s private dumpster: They’re on to you. A “terrible odor” on May 9 prompted a call to police.

After 28 years fielding 911 calls as an East Hampton Village dispatcher, Gerry Turza will be hired at the May 19 East Hampton Village Board meeting for a new village position: fire and emergency medical services administrator. Mr. Turza served as chief of the East Hampton Village Fire Department from 2018 to 2022 and in many other roles, all in the field of public safety, for the last 30 years.