Trapped in raid
Police raided a store at 218 Centre St. near Grand St. at 5:35 p.m. Tues. April 3 for trademark infringement and discovered after a 911 phone call two hours later that a dozen people were trapped in the basement.
Three men and two women were initially arrested and charged with trademark infringement after police found dozens of plastic bags filled with handbags, sunglasses and wallets with counterfeit trademarks.
The 911 call later was seeking information about someone who had gone to the store earlier but had not returned. Police went back and found the people, including at least one younger than 17, who said the shop owners had herded them into the basement when the raid began and told them to wait.
Three men, Wei Li, 35, of Queens, Hung Tong, 33, of Brooklyn, and Kwan Woo Pei, whose age and residence were not released at press time, were charged with unlawful imprisonment and endangering the welfare of a person under the age of 17, as well as trademark infringement. The two women, Miao Liu, 44, and A Ying Xia, 35, were charged only with the trademark violation.
The defendants were awaiting arraignment at press time on Wednesday.
L.E.S. hold-ups
Police are looking for a suspect wanted in four armed robberies of stores and a gas station on the Lower East Side between March 5 and March 20.
The robber, who waived a silver handgun or a black knife in the hold-ups and made his getaways in a silver Dodge Charger with Massachusetts plates, hit the United Deli and Grocery at 221 E. Broadway near Clinton St. twice, once at 2:45 a.m. on March 5 and again at 4:40 a.m. March 19, police said. He held up the bodega at 130 Eldridge St. between Broome and Delancey Sts. at 4:08 a.m. March 20 and an hour later struck the gas station at 523 Grand St. at Jackson St.
The suspect, described only as Hispanic and in his 20s, also held up a Howard Johnson Hotel on Boston Rd., near Bronx Park at 2 a.m. March 16, police said.
Subway robbery
A woman walking up the stairs of the Canal (A,C,E) subway station south of Canal St. at 11 p.m. on March 20 was attacked by a man who knocked her down, took $80 in cash and her cell phone and fled on foot up Sixth Ave., police said. The victim, 23, sustained face injuries but refused medical attention.
Student assault
Two girls, 14, students at Unity, the Department of Education’s second-opportunity high school at The Door, 555 Broome St. just west of Sixth Ave., got into a fight on Wednesday afternoon March 28 and one of them was unconscious for less than half a minute before she was taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital for observation, according to the Department of Education. The other girl was charged as a juvenile with assault. Both were at the school because they had been suspended from their original schools.
The Door, which runs its own second-opportunity middle school and other programs for troubled youth, has also been involved with two incidents of teen violence this year. A 13-year-old from its program stabbed another Door teen a few blocks from the building in January, and a 15-year-old student threw a chair at a security guard in February.
Hudson Sq. burglary
Burglars got into an apartment at 481 Greenwich St. on the northeast corner of Canal St. sometime on Friday night March 23 and made off with $5,000 in cash, foreign currency worth about $1,000, jewelry valued at $25,000 and a 20-inch flat screen television, police said. The thieves entered through an open penthouse door on the seventh floor and left by a sixth-floor fire escape, police said.
Soho assault
A woman under arrest for disorderly conduct at about 8:10 p.m. Fri. March 30 on W. Broadway between Spring and Prince Sts. kicked and struggled with the arresting officer, police said. The suspect, Sandy Monet, 22, was charged with assault and resisting arrest. The officer went to New York Downtown Hospital with a shoulder injury.
School guard arrested
Police arrested Wendell Nobel, 28, a school safety officer somewhere in Chinatown’s Fifth Precinct, at 7 p.m. Tues. March 27 and charged him with domestic harassment. He was suspended pending resolution of the charge. Police did not release the name of the public school.
Truck gone
A driver who parked a rented truck loaded with computers and copying machines on Dominick St. between Hudson and Varick Sts. around 2 p.m. on Thurs. March 22 returned about 10:30 a.m. the following day and discovered it had been stolen, police said.
Lift and separate
A woman walked into Victoria’s Secret, 565 Broadway, at about 5:30 p.m. Sun. April 1, took 45 bras with a total value of $2,500 from a display case and walked out without paying for them, police said.
Stolen BMW
A man who parked his 2005 BMW at the parking garage at 111 Washington St. near Carlisle St. at 8 a.m. Mon. April 2 discovered when he returned for it at 2:30 p.m. that someone else had driven it off, police said.
—Albert Amateau
