Police & Courts

Keen O. Rodney, 32, who splits his time between Florida and Montauk, was arrested last week on a felony assault charge after an alleged fight with his roommates over some fish, but asserted during his arraignment last Thursday that he was in fact the victim. He was defending himself, he said, when he swung a baseball bat at Omar Godfried Deer, breaking the man’s wrist.



The fight happened at around noon on June 24. Mr. Deer told East Hampton Town detectives that he and Mr. Rodney had been roommates for the past few weeks on Second House Road, along with Mr.

Firefighters from six departments braved hot, humid weather last Thursday to battle a fire at 285 Hayground Road in Water Mill, north of Montauk Highway. The fire was caused by “a major electrical event,” John Rankin, a Southampton Town fire marshal, said this week. It started in the attic and badly damaged the older part of the house, leaving it temporarily uninhabitable.

Amagansett

A Specialized 21-speed mountain bicycle that was “left unsecured” at the entrance to Indian Wells Beach was stolen the afternoon of June 25. Eric Kalabacos told police he had been at the beach for an hour when he discovered the theft. Police gave the lifeguards a description of the $1,200 blue-and-white bicycle and asked them to be on the lookout for it.



Two bikes were stolen from a Mako Lane yard on the night of June 21. Julia Loudon described one as an “older, rusty, dark blue Free Spirit woman’s bike” with a basket on front.

The New York State Police are deploying more assets on the South Fork, leading to more arrests on alcohol-related charges. “We’re focusing on the midnight tours,” Sgt. James Marrone said Tuesday. “We’re sending out at least one vehicle when we have a car available.”



Besides making arrests on driving while intoxicated charges, state police have also launched an operation to catch those who sell alcohol to under-age drinkers.

A native of Colombia who spent Saturday night celebrating his nation’s World Cup victory against Uruguay that day wound up on a gurney outside East Hampton Town Justice Court Sunday morning following his arraignment on a charge of drunken driving.



Christhian Eduardo Roa, 30, was pulled over on Montauk Highway at 5:30 a.m. Sunday for swerving across lane lines.

The discovery by East Hampton Village police of a large cache of marijuana reportedly concealed under the hood of a BMW during a routine traffic stop in May was the impetus for a day-long class for law enforcement officials on the variety of ways criminals conceal drugs, weapons, cash, and other contraband in a vehicle.



Conducted at East Hampton Village police headquarters on Friday by Jason Robles, a New York State trooper who freelances with Palestra Group International, the eight-hour course drew 71 law enforcement professionals from agencies as diverse as the East H

The Springs Fire Department quickly extinguished a fire that was believed to have started on the exterior of a house in Springs on Tuesday evening, but the house was badly damaged, according to Chief Ben Miller.



A neighbor reported flames at 52 Cedar Drive, between Locust and Dogwood Drives, at 5:46 p.m., according to the chief.

A Brooklyn man was arrested by East Hampton Village and Town officers Friday afternoon following a chase through the woods near Georgica Pond in Wainscott. A town officer, who suffered a knee injury during the pursuit, finally stopped the fleeing man by discharging his Taser.



Paul Freckleton, 25, who was riding a motorcycle, was first stopped by the village officer, near Georgica restaurant, where he is employed as a cook.



“One of our officers made a stop for passing on the right,” said Detective Lt. Anthony Long. Mr.

East Hampton Town and Village stand to save a combined $600,000 if an initial cost savings analysis about consolidating 911 dispatching services rings true.

That is why the municipalities are hoping to receive a $25,000 matching grant from the Local Government Efficiency program to help fund a more in-depth study, which will consider operational and cost impacts.

An object falling from the sky brought out the East Hampton Town Marine Patrol to search for about an hour Tuesday evening near Gardiner’s Island. Ed Michels, the town harbormaster, said they received a call from a boater, who could not describe the falling object, except to say it was definitely not a body.

“We got the call about an hour before dark,” Mr. Michels said. “We used the whole Gardiner’s Island crew.” The search was called off after about an hour as the sun sank below the horizon.

 

One town police officer pulled over two cars driven by employees of the same Montauk restaurant on Sunday morning and arrested both drivers. One was charged with felony drunken driving, the other with driving with ability impaired by drugs.

Officer David E. Martin Jr. was in the parking lot of the Montauk train station a little before 11 a.m. when he saw a 2013 Nissan pull out of the lot by Ciao, a new restaurant where its driver, Matthew R. DiGirolomo, 22, of Whitestone, is employed as a waiter.

East Hampton Village police arrested five Ross Upper School students on the evening of June 18 at the East Hampton Nature Trail, charging all five with possession of open containers of alcohol. One of the students, four of whom are foreign nationals, was charged with possession of marijuana. Because the five are all 17 or younger, police did not release their names.

Police were tipped off to the youths’ nightly activities by a video posted on Facebook.

East Hampton

A mailbox along Washington Avenue was reported stolen Friday morning. Bruce Bates said it had been removed from its post at the end of his driveway. It was later found on Indian Wells Beach.

East Hampton Village

A white-and-red 12-speed woman’s bicycle with black lettering was reported stolen from a Further Lane property.

A woman charged with drunken driving after an early morning, single-car accident in Southampton Village on April 19 in which a Water Mill man died has been indicted by a Suffolk County grand jury on multiple felony charges, including vehicular manslaughter.

Allison Rydberg of Hampton Bays was arraigned Monday in Central Islip before acting Supreme Court Justice Fernando Camacho. The vehicular manslaughter charge was based on a police statement that her blood-alcohol content at the time of the accident was over .18 of 1 percent.

Ms.

Two Brooklyn siblings who had spent Sunday night in Montauk with a group of friends spent Monday morning in East Hampton Town Justice Court, where they were arraigned on charges of driving while intoxicated.

East Hampton Town police pulled over Harryson F. Gallegos, 25, at about 3:30 a.m. as he was headed west on Napeague, saying his 2003 Nissan S.U.V. had been speeding. His sister, Ashley M. Gallegos, 21, was in the car, along with a number of other passengers. Mr.

An S.U.V. rolled over on the Napeague stretch of Montauk Highway, west of the Lobster Roll restaurant, on June 11, injuring the driver. The single-car accident happened at about 1:05 p.m.

The 20-year-old driver, Andy J. Amando, who said he had been wearing a seatbelt, was already out of his 2002 Mitsubishi when police arrived. He was conscious, but bleeding severely from his head, according to an East Hampton Town police accident report. 

The Amagansett Fire Department’s on-duty paramedic treated Mr.

East Hampton Town police made several arrests over the past two weeks on violence-related charges, all of which resulted in court orders of protection for the alleged victims.

A Southampton man who was convicted of a felony drug charge earlier this year but has yet to be sentenced, and who is facing a second felony charge as well, was arrested Tuesday afternoon on yet another felony count, assault with a weapon.

According to Maggie Bopp, the assistant district attorney representing the county during the arraignment of Gabriel L.

An East Hampton man was charged with felony burglary on Friday afternoon. East Hampton Town police said Dustin G. Miller, 25, had entered a garage at 91 Whooping Hollow Road in East Hampton on May 18 and removed items without the owner’s permission.

A worker on the property, Carlos Guzman, told police that he was in the basement that day, after other workers there had left, when he heard voices in the yard. Going outside, he saw Mr. Miller and another man.

East Hampton

A vandal smashed a driver’s-side window and a rear taillight and dented the left-rear quarter panel on a 2008 Honda Accord parked in a lot at 121 Springs-Fireplace Road early Friday morning. Maria Restrepo estimated the damage at $500.

 

East Hampton Village

Two men police described as homeless got into a brief scuffle at the train station on the morning of June 10. One of the two said he had confronted the other man because he was “spreading rumors” about him, and ended up with a “bump” on the head.

A 6-year-old girl died on Sunday morning after being struck by a car on Blank Lane in Water Mill. The child, Tess Burstein, was declared dead at Stony Brook University Hospital, where she had been rushed by ambulance after first being taken to Southampton Hospital.

According to Southampton Detective Sgt. Lisa Costa, Tess’s condition was initially thought to have stabilized, but she regressed.

The captain of a Montauk fishing vessel pleaded guilty last month to a single misdemeanor charge of illegally harvesting striped bass worth over $250. Christopher L. Miller, 44, the captain of Sea Spearit, which docks at the West Lake Marina, had been indicted by a grand jury on April 2 and was facing multiple charges, including a felony for harvesting over $1,000 worth of the protected fish. After pleading guilty to the single charge on May 22 before Acting Supreme Court Justice Fernando M. Camacho, in Central Islip, the additional charges were dismissed. Mr.

A Coast Guard search for a boat in distress ended with the season’s first boating-while-intoxicated arrest.

According to Petty Officer Corey Carlucci, who was involved in the rescue mission, the Coast Guard station on Star Island, Montauk, was notified by the East Hampton Town Police Department of a call reporting a 20-foot boat adrift in Napeague Bay. The pilot was reported to be slumped over the wheel, apparently unconscious.

The Coast Guard treated the situation as a boat in distress and began searching for the vessel.

Julio Mario Galeano, an East Hampton Village police officer who allegedly used a house on Talmage Lane in East Hampton for a romantic encounter with a female member of the department in December without the permission of the house’s owner, will resign from the department effective Aug. 2.

Terms of his resignation are subject to ratification by the East Hampton Village Board, according to a statement issued Monday by Rebecca Molinaro, the village administrator. On Tuesday, Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr.

Amagansett

An unwelcome visitor apparently looking for a bed to sleep in free of charge kicked open a door at a Pine Way house at some point over the past two weeks. The frame and door were damaged and will cost about $300 to repair. Adam Young told police on Saturday that the intruder had slept in a bed, but had not taken anything.

 

East Hampton

An American flag on a wooden pole was stolen from the driveway of an Indian Hill Road house on Friday night.

A Northport nanny is facing felony drunken-driving charges following her arrest on the afternoon of June 3. Town police said Inese Stankiewicz, 55, was backing up a 2014 Ford in the public parking lot east of South Edgemere Street in Montauk shortly after 1 p.m. when she hit a parked car, then drove away. Witnesses described the Ford, which was pulled over a few minutes later on Second House Road.

Back at police headquarters, Ms.

Relative calm returned to local roads after a Memorial Day week that saw 15 arrests on charges of drunken or drugged driving. East Hampton Town police have since made only two such arrests; village police, just one.

Police stopped the driver of a 2002 BMW on Three Mile Harbor Road in East Hampton early Tuesday morning for failing to dim her headlights and wound up charging her with driving while intoxicated after administering roadside sobriety tests.

Theresa Fisher, 24, was also charged with unlicensed driving.

A disciplinary hearing for Julio Galeano, the East Hampton Village police officer who allegedly used a house on Talmage Lane for a romantic visit with a fellow member of the force without its owner’s knowledge, is scheduled for tomorrow at 10:30 a.m. at the Emergency Services Building.

John G. Callahan, an attorney who was appointed by the village board as an independent arbitrator to hear the charges against Mr. Galeano, will listen to comments and testimony. After the hearing, which may take more than one session, Mr.

A Springs man who was standing in the middle of the Main Street-Jermain Avenue intersection in Sag Harbor Monday night, punching the hoods of cars stopped at the traffic light there with his bare fists, faces two felony charges of criminal mischief.

Sag Harbor Village police said Adam P. Kopoulos, 24, who was reportedly intoxicated, caused thousands of dollars’ worth of damage. It took both police officers on duty that evening to subdue him after a caller told a dispatcher what was happening.

Two cars suffered the most damage, a 2009 Nissan Sentra and a BMW.

Amagansett

A locksmith making a house call apparently visited the wrong house last month. Thomas MacNiven told police that sometime between May 1 and May 9, “the backdoor knob and lock were drilled out, and were replaced” on an Amagansett house with a Montauk Highway address. Nothing was removed from the house, and the old lock and knob were found just inside.

East Hampton Town police have identified a woman found dead in her car in Montauk on Monday as Nikole Doering, 37, of Coram. Her family had reported her missing the day before.

Det. Sgt. Greg Schaefer said yesterday that police were investigating the cause of death, but that it did not appear suspicious.

The body was found in an S.U.V. parked in a public lot on an Old Montauk Highway bluff facing the ocean. Two guests at the Surfside Inn, which is across the road and a little to the east, called police at about 3 p.m.