Police & Courts

Blue-claw crabs, copper catalytic converters, and . . . used cooking oil? Opportunistic thieves have gotten creative in their pursuit of ill-gotten gains in these inflationary times, but used cooking oil does not immediately spring to mind as a high-ticket product worthy of theft. It is a big problem on Long Island and one that visited the East End in recent weeks in a crime wave that hit numerous local and regional restaurants, including Harvest on Fort Pond in Montauk and the Lobster Roll on Napeague.

A complaint about “a structure constructed out of trash” brought police to a beach between Big Albert’s Landing and the pier at the Bell Estate on Aug. 26, where they found a small structure made from driftwood, painted in different colors.

Three cases involving East Hampton residents arrested last summer have been wrapped up in East Hampton Town Justice Court.

The Suffolk County District Attorney is set to dismiss all eight charges against Pat Mansir, a past vice chairwoman of the East Hampton Independence Party and a former East Hampton Town councilwoman.

Joseph Grippo was sentenced on Wednesday to 20 years in prison plus five years of supervised release, the outcome of the legal proceedings stemming from his deadly attack on Robert Casado on a Kirk Park trail in Montauk in June 2019.

East Hampton Village was again the scene of an outbreak of criminally mischievous painting last week, following a spate of spray-painting and graffiti two weeks ago.

A Bronxville, N.Y., woman allegedly drove a 2016 Land Rover into a 2015 Toyota on the morning of Aug. 23, during a dispute over a parking spot at the Pantigo Road CVS.

When David Plotkin collapsed while biking on Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett, bystanders and lifeguards jumped into action, helping to perform CPR for 15 minutes as they waited for an ambulance. That Mr. Plotkin survived is thanks to their quick action.

He hit a tree and was found "unresponsive and having difficulty breathing," then police said they found three small plastic bags of a “white rock-like substance,” later determined to be cocaine, in the car.

The couple who own the Noyac rental house where two young women died in a fire on Aug. 3 together face 58 building code violations in Southampton Town Justice Court, including charges that “no fewer than three” smoke alarms weren’t working, a town official has confirmed.

A Sag Harbor man was charged last Thursday evening with felony assault on a police officer after police tried to arrest him on charges of driving while intoxicated.

Four men were charged with driving while intoxicated on local roads over the past weekend.

Laney Ettel of Virginia Beach was having dinner Friday night at Gurney's Star Island Resort in Montauk when, she told police, her purse went missing.

Another late-night car accident has rattled residents of Hampton Street (Route 114) in Sag Harbor. Early Saturday morning, near a curve in the road at Division Street, an 18-year-old was charged with driving while intoxicated after flipping his car onto another that was parked in its owners' driveway. The incident echoed several other crashes in the same vicinity. 

Among arrests in town last week was one in Montauk involving an East Hampton Town traffic control officer.

Leandre Hadden of Philadelphia was fishing last week for porgies and sea bass off Block Island, on the Fin Chaser party boat out of Star Island Yacht Club, Montauk, when he discovered $970 had gone missing from his person.

An unlicensed 16-year-old from Montauk was eastbound on Montauk Highway in Amagansett just before midnight on Sunday when, she later told East Hampton Town police, she felt a pain in her head and either passed out or fell asleep at the wheel.

Marlene Julie Pabon of the Bronx, 40, was charged on the morning of Aug. 16 with menacing a police officer after she allegedly brandished an eight-inch folding knife at him.

A teenage get-together Sunday night on Arbor Path wasn't what a mother signed up for when she gave her two daughters permission to have some friends over. She returned from a night out to a house full of juveniles who wouldn't leave.

A second person accused of stealing $94,000 worth of handbags from a high-end retail store in East Hampton Village has pleaded guilty to grand larceny, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office announced on Friday.

After police pulled over a Sagaponack man for going 90 miles per hour ina. 30 m.p.h. zone, a slew of charges followed incouding two felonies and misdemeanors for allegedly driving while intoxicated.

A charge of third-degree assault followed a car accident that led to an altercation.

There were numerous reports of vandalism via spray paint and graffiti in East Hampton Village last Thursday, beginning with a police car that was parked in the lot behind headquarters on North Main Street. Someone sprayed its entire passenger-side blue.

It was a busy Saturday night on Georgica Pond for the East Hampton Town Marine Patrol as numerous people were ticketed last week for illegally harvesting blue-claw crabs — an ever-growing poaching problem, say town officials, and one that they are struggling to get the upper hand on.

Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney has secured a guilty plea from the first of five people accused of stealing $94,000 worth of handbags from the luxury retailer Balenciaga in East Hampton Village in March.

The manager at Sag Harbor’s popular Corner Bar, told Sag Village police last Thursday morning that a patron who had become ill after eating a dish of mussels was harassing the restaurant.

Bike vs. car; dump drunk vs. Suburban, Suburban vs. Suburban.

The criminal case against Charles Streep of East Hampton and Manhattan, stemming from a highly publicized altercation in a bank parking lot two summers ago, ended in December when Mr. Streep pleaded guilty to a greatly reduced charge of disorderly conduct. His adversary has since filed a civil case against him.

On Saturday night well after hours, when most lifeguards are home and dry, Thomas Casse was at a dinner party at the Montauk Shores Condominiums just east of Ditch Plain when another attendee, Sophie Walton, first heard a faint cry for help.

In on accident in Springs at around 10:30 p.m. on Aug. 9, a 2005 Audi left the road and hit a retaining wall, a basketball hoop, and a mailbox at a house on Guernsey Lane, sustaining significant damange. A trail of fluid from the accident led police to the vehicle, which the driver had parked at her nearby home.