Attempted rape indictment
A grand jury indicted Michael Torres, 29, on March 14 for the sexual assault and attempted rape of a woman in the Bowery station of the J train on Feb 8 of this year. A spokesperson for the Manhattan District Attorney said Torres is charged with pulling the victim off an escalator using a choke hold, dragging her to the end of the platform and onto the track where he repeatedly banged her head against the rails, pulled her by the hair further into the tunnel and sexually assaulted her. An MTA employee who heard her screams came to her aid.
“Why are you looking at me?”
Police responded to a call from an employee of a baby shop at 230 Mulberry St. shortly before 3 p.m. Wed., April 11 who told them a suspect had just snatched her iPad from the counter and fled with it on foot toward Houston St. Two Transit Anti Terrrorism officers decided to check out the Bleecker/Lafayette St. subway station at Houston St., where they spotted someone fitting the description of the suspect and holding an iPad. “Why are you guys looking at me like I just stole this iPad,” said the suspect just before he fled with the officers in pursuit. The suspect, Kevin Chavis, 22, fought with the officers, inflicting a broken wrist on one and cuts on both of them. He is charged with larceny, assaulting the officers and resisting arrest.
Loaded gun
Police arrested a suspect in the Canal St. C train subway station around 10 p.m. Tues., April 10 and charged him with weapon possession after they found a .38 caliber Taurus handgun loaded with hollow point bullets in his pocket. The suspect, Rahmeek Younger, struggled with the arresting office and was charged also with resisting arrest.
Groping arrest
Police arrested Karl Vanderwoude, 26, on Fri., April 13 and charged him with groping four women in Lower Manhattan, the Village, and the Upper East Side over the past few months. Vanderwoude is accused of groping a woman, 22, on March 30 and sticking a camera under her skirt as she exited the Chamber St. subway station. On Feb. 26 he was accused of grabbing a woman’s buttocks and crotch on Varick and King Sts. The following day, he was alleged to have groped a woman on Second Ave. near E. 67th St. On the afternoon of Feb. 25 he was accused of groping a woman, 33, on E. 62nd St. and Park Ave. Vanderwoude’s lawyer, Lori Cohen, said that her client, a “gentleman who conducted weekly Bible classes “ in his Brooklyn apartment, was innocent. He was released on his own recognizance,
Hand grenade scare
A mail room employee at 2 World Financial Center in Battery Park City on Thursday morning April 12 spotted what looked like a World War II hand grenade in the x-ray image of an arriving package and alerted authorities who ordered everyone to leave the 44-=story building. The grenade was a harmless novelty mounted on a plaque that read, “Complaint Department. Please take a number,” with a number tag on the pin of the grenade. An employee of Nomura Holdings, the Japanese bank whose U.S. head office is in the building, had ordered the item and had it shipped to his office. The worker “was placed on leave,“ the bank said.
Tapped the money
More than $5,000 was reported missing on Mon., April 9 from the basement safe of Tribeca Tap House, 365 Greenwich St., police said. Employees said they locked the money in the safe on Fri., April 6. Police said there were no signs of forced entry.
Occupy Wall St.
An Occupy Wall St. protestor who stood on the northwest corner of Broad and Wall Sts. around 12:30 p.m. Fri., April 13 was arrested for shouting obscenities at the lunchtime crowd, police said. While in the car being taken for booking, the suspect, Zachary William, 25, was restrained when police saw him biting his own right hand. In the struggle one of the cops sustained a broken left hand, police said.
Downtown assaults
A man from Blue Point, L.I., was arguing with an acquaintance in Dubliner Bar, 45 Stone St., around 12:40 p.m. Thurs. April 5 when his adversary hauled off and punched him, knocking him unconscious and breaking his cheek bone. The victim told police he spent two and a half days in Bellevue undergoing five operations to repair his face.
A Lower East Side man, 45, told police he got into a conversation with a woman stranger at Warren 77, the bar at 77 Warren St., around 2:40 a.m. Sat., April 14 when she took exception to something he said, picked up a glass, hit him in the face with it and fled.
Copped copper piping
The manager of a construction site at 6 Liberty St. told police that copper piping, valued at $5.500, was installed on the site on March 17 and was reported stolen April 4. Workers from various trades had access to the site, and security guards were on duty, police said.
— Albert Amateau
