As Mayor Michael Bloomberg would later attest, New Yorkers were quite well behaved during the wee hours of August 28, as Hurricane (and later Tropical Storm) Irene bore down on the city in all her fury. Only 30 arrests were reported citywide, compared to the customary 345-some between midnight and 7:30 a.m. for a Sunday during August. Most of this very-mini Irene crime wave consisted of domestic disturbances with the odd burglary thrown in. Here’s a sampling of some of the odder infractions from that morning, as compiled by the New York Times’ Michael Wilson.
Bronx: Robbers stole $46 from a cash-only parking lot and a man was stopped for carrying an unconcealed weapon (it was wrapped in plastic, we suppose, in preparation for Irene’s heavy rains).
Brooklyn: A 23-year-old woman assaulted a man around midnight with an umbrella and another younger woman was whacked in the head by a Corona bottle (the perp: her own sister).
Manhattan: A man driving near the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge was stopped with “bloodshot watery eyes, slurred speech, a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage.”
Queens: A man keyed — well, technically, he knifed — a car in Rockaway Beach and 29 Apple computers were stolen from a building in Flushing.
Staten Island: Thieves broke into the ironically named Around the Clock Deli and stole cigarettes while across the island another man was arrested for trying to steal $3,000 worth of merchandise from another store.
As a police spokesman told the Times: “Bad weather outside was no guarantee of good behavior inside.”
A Time of Drenching Rain, Gusting Wind and Peculiar Crimes [NYT]
