Slashing attack
A Queens man, 22, told police he got into an argument with a stranger on the northwest corner of Sixth Ave. and Canal St. around 6:45 p.m. Thurs., April 8, and the stranger pulled a box cutter and slashed his leg. The victim fled into the nearby subway station, but the suspect followed and slashed again under the victim’s right ear and around to the back of his neck and then fled, police said. An Emergency Medical Services team took the victim to St. Vincent’s in one of the last ambulance trips to the hospital, which stopped receiving trauma ambulances the following day.
Grabs cab phone
A young man who hailed a cab at Hudson and Christopher Sts. during the early hours of Wed., April 14, grabbed a cell phone that was on the seat next to the driver and struggled with him before he fled with the phone, police said. The driver chased and caught the suspect at Grove and Bedford Sts. where police arrested Marcus Avenger, 18. The suspect, a resident of W. 122nd St., is to appear in court July 6 on a third-degree robbery charge, said a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney.
Bye-bye Banya gang
Wen Ming Lin, a leader in a violent Chinatown gang known as the Banya Organization — named after the Chinese village where many of the members hail from — pleaded guilty on April 16 to racketeering, conspiracy, extortion, assaults and gambling, according to Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District in Manhattan. In addition to Wen, also known as Yi Mai, another Banya member, Zhau Lin, known also as Big Flower, pleaded guilty on April 16 to similar charges.
Eleven other members of the gang, operating in Flushing, Queens, in addition to Chinatown, previously pleaded guilty.
Wen and Zhau were involved in extortions from the owners of two bus companies in Chinatown, according to court papers. Wen assaulted employees of both companies, the charges say. Another Banya member, Jian Liang Lin, known as Cousin, is awaiting trial.
Consequence of cutting
A patron of Via Dei Mille, 375 West Broadway near Broome St., who was waiting on a queue at the men’s room during the early hours of Sat., April 10, became enraged when another patron cut in ahead of him. The suspect hit the line-jumper in the face with a bottle, broke his nose and fled, police said.
Broken bones
A box of bones, some of them broken, that was found in the garbage at Columbia and East Houston Sts. in the Baruch Houses complex on Wednesday afternoon April 14, provoked a storm of rumors on the Lower East Side and brought police, who cordoned off the site and sent the bones to the Medical Examiner’s Office. The medical examiner determined on Fri., April 19, that the bones were not human, but had not said what kind of bones they were.
Phone filched
A 17-year-old girl was walking on Canal St. between Mercer St. and Broadway around 3:20 p.m. Thurs., April 15, when she felt her backpack being jostled, police said. The victim thought it was her cell phone vibrating in the backpack and checked it, only to discover the cell phone was gone.
Broome St. burglary
A resident of 366 West Broadway at Broome St. went out at 8:30 a.m. Tues., March 30, and returned at 9 p.m. that night to find her door had been pried open and numerous items, including a laptop computer, an iPod, a digital camera, an Yves St. Laurent bag, a gold necklace, three watches and her wallet, with a total value of $7,080, had been stolen, police said.
Laptops lifted
The resident of an apartment at 98 Thompson St., between Spring and Prince Sts., left for a Saturday night out at 8 p.m. April 10 and returned at 6:15 a.m. the next day to find the bedroom window by a fire escape open, the curtains on the floor and that two laptop computers, with a total value of $2,200, were missing, police said.
Raid Kate Spade
Three men walked into the Kate Spade boutique at 454 Broome St. on Monday evening, March 22, and one then held the door open while the other two grabbed seven handbags valued at a total of $2,225, police said. The thieves fled in a Chevy Impala parked nearby, police said. Witnesses told police the three had been hanging around just before entering the store, observing traffic lights and customers as they entered and left the boutique.
Didn’t quite register
Burglars entered the Lucky Brand Jeans store, 127 Prince St., through a side door at 11:30 p.m. Tues., March 30, and damaged a cash register, but left without taking anything, police said.
Critical Mass case
The trial of Patrick Pogan, 24, the former New York Police Department rookie officer — charged with pushing a Critical Mass bicycle rider off his bike at Seventh Ave. and 47th St. during the group’s monthly ride in July 2008 and filing a false report about the incident — began Mon., April 19.
The jury on Monday saw the video taken by a witness at the time and which has been seen on YouTube more than 2 million times.
The rider, Christopher Long, was charged at the time with assaulting the officer, but the charge was dismissed, and Pogan, who had been on the job 11 days when the incident occurred, resigned from the N.Y.P.D.
Long sued the city for $1.5 million for false arrest and settled the case for $65,000.
Pogan is charged with assault and filing a false report. His lawyer, Stuart London, said at the trial’s opening that Long provoked the attack. London also said that Pogan was so unfamiliar with his Critical Mass assignment that he thought it was a Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. (See article on Page 11 in this issue for more on the trial.)
Case of a coat
Two men and a woman walked into Lazaro Jewelry Soho, 475 Broome St., at 3:56 p.m. Wed., March 31, and one of the men entered a back room and made off with a coat belonging to an employee, police said. A surveillance tape shows one of the men stuffing the coat into a bag, police said. Nothing else was taken.
Albert Amateau
