Police & Courts

Warning that it could be a false alarm, a police dispatcher alerted officers on the evening of Feb. 25 that a caller had reported “a man with a possible bomb attached to his chest” on Main Street. Police found no such man nor any witnesses to the person described.

Police spotted a headlight out on a Chevy van, pulled the driver over, and said they found cocaine and fentanyl in the vehicle.

On Feb. 19, a Stuart’s Lane, East Hampton, woman reported two vehicles circling her neighborhood. Police found one vehicle parked on the shoulder. The driver explained that she was using the quiet street to teach her mother how to drive. The other vehicle was being used to practice parallel parking.

The clothing shop LoveShackFancy on Madison Street in Sag Harbor reported two separate thefts over the weekend. An arrest was made Thursday afternoon in connection with one of them.

A house under construction in Wainscott experienced heavy damage after a fire tore through it Friday morning. 

As many as 40 burglar alarms were triggered across both residential and commercial properties in East Hampton Town last week, in some places more than once in 24 hours.

A driver claimed that icy roads led to a crash, but police said he had failed a roadside sobriety test. He sustained a head injury with minor bleeding, they said, while his passenger was found to be semiconscious.

Police responded to a drunken brawl on Rolling Woods Court in Wainscott late last Thursday night. A fight between two men had spilled over into a driveway. One of the two, bleeding from a punch in the face, pushed the other to the ground, "scratching his rib cage," according to the report.

The East Hampton Village Board targeted false fire-alarm scofflaws at a work session last week, raising the penalty for causing firefighters or village police to mobilize needlessly.

The Southampton Town Kiwanis Club honored police officers from both East Hampton Town and Village at an awards dinner on Jan. 31, with Nicole Fierro winning Officer of the Year for the town.

Two drivers lost control on the ice, while an East Hampton man was taken to the hospital after his sedan was rear-ended by a van.

A Sag Harbor woman reported a stranger in her backyard early Sunday morning. Police concluded that undisturbed snow on the ground suggested that nobody had entered her property. She then told the officer, “Maybe I didn’t see anyone, I just thought I did.” 

A Sag Harbor woman reported a scam that defrauded her of more than $200,000 to Sag Harbor Village police — and ultimately the Federal Bureau of Investigation — after a previously unknown individual contacted her on Instagram.

“The area is kind of like a tinder box, to a degree, and it wouldn’t take much to set off a fire,” East Hampton Fire Chief Duane Forrester said after a recent meeting with several town officials at the Northwest Woods Trail to discuss a plan for fire safety in the area.

In the blotter this week a Springs resident told police back on Dec. 5 that she’d received a video of herself, accompanied by a threat that the video would be shared unless she sent $500 to its unknown sender. The woman did not send money.

Police made one felony-level arrest on a charge of aggravated drunken driving early on Monday morning, and another man was charged with violating an order of protection.

When a box with two vacuum-sealed packages of marijuana arrived at the doorstep of an Osborne Lane man, he reported it to police.

The East Hampton Town Police Department announced this week that it is now accepting applications for its 2025 Citizens Academy, which is intended to give residents insight into how local police departments operate.

On Sunday evening, the assistant manager of Sportime told police he’d seen two drunken men harassing the snack stand attendant and asked them to leave, which they did, briefly, but then ran back in and punched him.

Southampton Town police charged a Bay Shore woman with two felonies last Thursday, saying, first, that she’d left the scene of an accident on Sagg Main Street in Sagaponack, and second, after being located, was discovered to be in possession of “a “quantity of illegal drugs and paraphernalia.” 

Andrey Trigubovich, named the new chief of East Hampton Volunteer Ocean Rescue, has been a member of the group since 2009, and has served as a lieutenant and a first assistant chief. He takes over the top post from Barnaby Friedman, who served as chief for three terms.

A resident of Crystal Drive in Springs who thought he was calling Optimum on Friday about getting a channel to watch the New York Knicks encountered a scammer instead.

The New York State Clean Slate Act, which establishes a framework for sealing records related to certain offenses and addresses “some of the collateral consequences that follow a criminal conviction,” took effect last month, and while some local attorneys view it as a tool for better rehabilitation, others think it is too broad in scope.

A man tried to return a toilet seat to Amagansett Hardware last Thursday afternoon, but employees turned down the request after noticing that the package had already been opened. The man became irate and police were called.

Update: A 56-year-old Riverside man last seen on Oct. 11 and reported missing on Nov. 3 was found dead in the woods off Route 114 in East Hampton on Monday morning.

According to an audit released on Dec. 24 by the New York State comptroller's office, the Montauk Fire District failed to file three years' worth of required financial reports, paid out unauthorized longevity and overtime to employees, and lacked oversight and consistency in administering its length-of-service award program (LOSAP) for Montauk's 131 volunteer firefighters and emergency medical technicians.

A businesswoman on Springs-Fireplace Road contacted police recently after people told her they were receiving strange messages from her on WhatsApp and asked if “everything was okay.” Police told her to deactivate the account and contact her customers by other means.

Sag Harbor Village police spotted what appeared to be 12 drones flying at different altitudes over the Lance Cpl. Jordan Haerter Bridge last Thursday evening, after a caller reported seeing around seven of them that same night.

Two local men were hit by cars while bicycling on the evening of Dec. 19. One was taken to the hospital.

East Hampton Village police charged a local man last week with stealing $2,450 worth of merchandise, a class-E felony, from the Louis Vuitton store at the corner of Main Street and Newtown Lane.