Hit-run fatal
A hit-and-run driver struck and killed a man identified only as white and in his 20s at 3:20 a.m. Wed., May 25, as he was crossing Fifth Ave. between 22nd and 23rd Sts., police said. The victim was declared dead at the scene. The case is still under investigation.
Bad flow at Flow
Three New Jersey men who tried to stop a patron at Flow, the club at 150 Varick St. near Spring St., from beating up his girlfriend during the early hours of Sun., May 29, became victims themselves, police said.
Justin White, 29 and his cousins William Shivers, 26, and John Shivers, 29, told police they tried to break up the fighting couple at about 3:15 a.m. when the man turned on them and beat and slashed them. The fighting couple fled the club in a taxi before police arrived and the three victims were taken to the hospital in stable condition.
Raid poker clubs
Police raided two illegal gambling clubs, one at 6 W. 14th St. in the Village and the other at 200 W. 72nd St., on Thursday night, May 26, and charged a total of 39 dealers, managers and other employees with misdemeanor offenses, police said.
The investigation began in November of last year when police vice squad detectives infiltrated Play Station, the club on W. 14th St., and New York Players Club on W. 72nd St., according to police.
About $50,000 was seized at each location during the May 26 raid but no weapons or alcohol were found on the premises where the tables were devoted to poker and blackjack. Police also seized a small amount of marijuana.
Playing poker is not unlawful but running a game for profit is against the law, police noted. None of the patrons, who according to published reports were at first afraid the raid was the beginning of a robbery, were arrested. Police said they were not sure whether the two operations were connected and the investigation is continuing.
Scooter accident
A man riding a motorized scooter fell and struck his head on the pavement at the intersection of W. 30th St. and Sixth Ave. at 8:36 p.m. Tues., May 24, police said. The victim, identified only as a white man, 38, was not wearing a helmet, police said. He was taken to Bellevue in critical condition.
The Producer
Susann Brinkley, who produced and directed the Off-Broadway “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” which played at the Jane St. Theater in the Village for many years and at the Broadway Theater in Chicago in 2001, pleaded guilty last week to third-degree grand larceny for stealing $48,000 from the nonprofit Ensemble Studio Theater (EST) of which she was executive director, said Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau.
The money was stolen by means of forged EST checks that Brinkley used to pay a 2003 judgment against her in connection with a civil suit brought by the New York State Attorney General’s office charging her with misappropriating the funds, a spokesperson for Morgenthau said.
The case arose in 2001 when Brinkley agreed to produce a play by Annie Reiner, “The New Living Room,” and accepted a $48,000 investment in the play from Reiner’s father, the writer and actor Carl Reiner, her brother, the director Rob Reiner, and George Shapiro, a producer and director.
Brinkley, however, never used the money for the Reiner play but for “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” which was having trouble in Chicago. The investors complained to Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, who filed the lawsuit and won a judgment in 2003. Brinkley paid back the investors in October 2003 with checks drawn on Ensemble Studio Theater accounts and purportedly signed by Curt Dempster, founder and artistic director of the company. Brinkley also filed a letter with Spitzer’s office in which Dempster was named a guarantor for the $48,000 restitution. But an investigation revealed that Dempster signed neither the checks nor the guaranty letter and EST referred the case to the district attorney. In addition to restitution, Brinkley, a Commerce St. resident, agreed to a lifetime ban on optioning new theatrical performances.
The May 24 plea means that Brinkley, 47, will receive five years probation and sign a confession of judgment for $40,000. She has already paid back $8,000 of the total amount.
Council street fair
The 13th Precinct Community Council will hold its annual street fair from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sat., June 25, on Second Ave. from 23rd to 34th Sts. Proceeds from the event will benefit the Council and the 13.13 Explorer Scout Troop which the Council sponsors.
Kids in car
Fifth Precinct police responded to a call at 7:14 p.m. Tues., May 24, that three children were sitting unattended in a new Chevrolet Malibu parked at the curb on Prince St. near Crosby St. They took the children, two boys, ages 6 and 11, and a 1-year-old girl, to the stationhouse on Elizabeth St. where their parents came looking for them at 8:35 p.m. The couple, Amaury Gonzalez, 26 and Clara Rodriguez, 21, of 101 Nostrand Ave., Brooklyn, were charged with endangering their welfare and the children were released in the custody of other relatives, police said.
Albert Amateau
