Fourth St. horror
Tenants at 120 E. Fourth St. summoned police at 3:10 p.m. Thurs. Sept. 15 when they found Serafin Vazquez, 59, in the hall in front of his first-floor apartment with multiple stab wounds in his head and torso and burns on his legs and torso. Police said the victim was taken to Bellevue Hospital in critical condition.
Residents in the building said they frequently saw people going in and out of the Vazquez apartment at all hours and surmised that he was the victim of a drug deal gone bad.
Hudson Sq. club ruckus
A man who was ejected from Club Flow at 150 Varick St. during the early hours of Sat. Sept 10, returned with a can of Mace and sprayed six police officers before he was subdued and arrested, police said.
A bouncer at the club near the corner of Spring St. phoned 911 at 3 a.m. to say that an angry patron who had been ejected from the club threatened to return with a gun. When police arrived, the bouncer pointed out the 6-foot-4-inch, 280-pound suspect, who had one hand in his pocket. On police orders, he took his hand out of his pocket, but pulled out the Mace and began spraying the officers. The suspect, Daniel Diaz, 25, was charged with assault, resisting arrest, and possession of a weapon.
Kim’s new crib
The rapper Lil’ Kim began serving her year-and-a-day prison sentence on Monday at the Federal Detention Center in Philadelphia. Kim, 30, whose real name is Kimberly Jones, was convicted earlier this year of lying to a federal grand jury about a shootout in front of Hot 97 FM on Hudson St. near Clarkson St. that involved two acquaintances of hers.
Vendors fight
A dispute over a vending spot just before 7 a.m. on Sat. Sept. 10 near the corner of Prince and Mercer Sts. ended in a fight and the arrest of one of the vendors, police said. The victim told police that his assailant hit him with a folding table, knocked him down and punched him in the chest. Police canvassed the vicinity and arrested Eran Salman, 25, and charged him with assault.
Attempted robbery
A woman walking with a male friend on Thompson St. just north of Canal St. at 7:30 p.m. Fri. Sept. 9 resisted a man who grabbed her bag, police said. The assailant hit her in the face and then punched and broke the glasses of her friend who came to her rescue, police said. The woman, 22, and her friend, 21, both of Brooklyn, hung onto the bag. Police canvassed the area and arrested Orpheus Grant, 22, charging him with the robbery attempt.
Sex sting arrest
The F.B.I. arrested a Greenwich Village resident after an Internet sting and charged him on Wed. Sept. 14 with soliciting a 13-year-old girl for sex. Timothy McDarrah, 43, a columnist for US Weekly magazine, was freed on $50,000 bail secured by $5,000 in cash, and was ordered to stay at home and wear an electronic monitor pending an Oct.14 appearance in Manhattan federal court.
The U.S. attorney’s office charged that McDarrah had responded to a sex ad that the F.B.I. had placed on the Craigslist Web site and said he wanted to have sex with “a young hottie.”
A federal agent arrested him at a location where he was told a 13-year-old girl would meet him.
Wandering loot
A burglar broke into the side door of a construction trailer at 40 Mercer St. on Thurs. Aug. 25 and made off with a computer and a monitor, police said. A day later, police at the 90th Precinct in Williamsburg picked up a “suspicious” package reported in a 911 phone call. The package proved to be the computer and monitor stolen from the Mercer St. trailer.
Monte on Canal
A visitor from San Juan, Puerto Rico, told police he stopped to play at a sidewalk three-card monte table on the south side of Canal St. between Church St. and Broadway at 1:30 p.m. Sun. Sept. 11 and was challenged, “Show me the money.” As soon as the visitor, 25, pulled $700 out of his pocket, the two card game operators snatched it, fled east and were lost in the crowd, police said.
Trial date for ex-student
Jury selection is to begin Nov. 2 in the New Haven federal court trial of Hakan Yalincak, 21, the former New York University history major charged with two multimillion dollar financial schemes.
Yalincak, whose family foundation made a $1.2 million contribution last year to N.Y.U., was indicted in June with his mother Ayferafet Yalincak, 50, on chargers that they defrauded investors by means of a fake hedge fund, Daedalus Capital Partners. Hakan Yalincak was indicted in May on separate charges of attempting to deposit fake certified checks in banks in Greenwich, Conn., and in Switzerland.
At a bail hearing in May, Hakan pleaded to be released to attend his N.Y.U. graduation, but the request was denied after a judge learned the defendant was not about to graduate. Both Hakan and his mother, who has already served a prison term in Indiana for using false documents to pose as a physician, are being held pending the outcome of trials. The family, Turkish nationals, has a home in Greenwich.
The Yalincak Family Foundation gave $1.2 million of a $21 million pledge to N.Y.U. for a lecture hall at 19 W. Fourth St. last year. John Beckman, spokesperson for the university, said soon after the indictments that any money that was ill gotten or that the family had no right to give would be returned to authorities. The university is waiting for the outcome of the trial to determine what to do with the money, Beckman added.
Pocket picked
A visitor from Minneapolis shopping in Soho on Saturday afternoon Sept. 10 discovered her wallet was missing from her bag while she was walking on West Broadway near Broome St., at about 3:30 p.m., police said. The victim, 47, told police she last opened the wallet in a clothing store at 113 Greene St. less than an hour before. By the time she reported the theft, there were about three unauthorized charges on her credit cards at various GAP stores totaling $5,000, police said.
Soho shoplifter
A man who walked into the Barneys shop at 116 Wooster St. at 4 p.m. Sat. Sept. 10 stuffed several pair of women’s designer jeans with a total value of $1,975 into a Macy’s shopping bag and fled. The thief, described only as a black man, was last seen running east on Spring St., police said.
Grand theft auto
A motorist who parked his 2003 BMW Suburban on the north side of Grand St. near the corner of Wooster St. at 2:30 a.m. Sun. Sept. 11 returned on Monday and found it gone. A check of towing services did not show the car had been towed for illegal parking, police said.
First Precinct Council
The First Precinct Community Council, which includes Hudson Sq. and the South Village as well as Lower Manhattan, will meet at 6:30 p.m. Wed. Sept. 28 at Wall St. Rising, 25 Broad St., for the annual election of council officers. Free pizza, courtesy of Exchange Pizza, will be served at the first council meeting of the season on Sept. 28. The council welcomes residents, businesses and people who work in the precinct.
Albert Amateau
