Murder suicide
A resident of 413 W. 16th St. in the Fulton Houses shot and killed his former girlfriend’s cousin and then shot himself in the head and died on Mon., Dec. 12, police said.
Kenneth Waldron, 29, encountered his estranged girlfriend in his apartment around 10:50 a.m. with her cousin, Brandon Romero, 20, who was helping her take her belongings from the place. He struggled with Romero, stabbed and shot him in the head and chest, then turned the gun on himself and put a bullet in his head.
An Emergency Medical Service team pronounced Waldron dead at the scene. Romero was taken to Beth Israel Hospital where he died a short time later.
Burglary-pattern arrest
Sixth Precinct police who staked out a high-burglary area around Hudson and W. 10th Sts. on Sun., Dec. 12, spotted a suspect walking into one building and out again a few minutes later. At 2:40 a.m. police followed the suspect when he walked into 523 Hudson St. and arrested Derkquon Battle, 25, in a hallway. Police charged the suspect with criminal trespass and possession of a controlled substance after finding a glass pipe with crack residue in his pants pocket.
‘Cat Lady’ convicted
Shanna Spalding, 29, charged with robbing two Soho boutiques and stores in Queens last year while wearing a cat mask or a black scarf wrapped tightly around her head, was found guilty of robbery and attempted robbery on Tues., Dec. 13. At the Aug. 25 robbery of Cotelac, 92 Greene St., she was armed with a fake handgun. Spalding sang under the name “Purgatory” with the death-metal band Devine Infamy.
Cell-phone attempt
Police are looking for a man who tried to snatch a cell phone from a woman, 29, while she was talking on it in front of the Rutgers Houses near Madison St. on Tuesday morning Nov. 29. The victim chased the suspect and retrieved the phone. A surveillance camera taped the suspect fleeing into 38 Rutgers St.
Tackler is taken in
Ian Rotundo, 33, was arrested for assault at 9:45 p.m. Thurs., Dec. 8, after two witnesses identified him as the suspect who earlier that night tackled a woman, 22, knocked her to the pavement and punched her at the corner of Christopher and Gay Sts.
DWI emergency
Seth Andrews, 35, a spokesperson for the Office of Emergency Management, was arrested for crashing his city-owned car into the rear of a cab, which in turn rammed a parked truck near King St. and Sixth Ave. around 11:30 p.m. Wed., Dec. 7. Andrews, a Lower Manhattan resident, refused police orders to get out of the car at first and when he complied, registered .196 in a field alcohol breath test, more than twice the legal limit. Taken to the Seventh Precinct for a formal charge, he refused to take a second test. He was taken to Bellevue Hospital for observation after he said he wanted to harm himself. Released later on $5,000 bail, he surrendered his driver’s license.
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John Martinez, who pleaded guilty last month to armed robbery, using either a knife or ice pick, against three women and attempted robbery against another woman in the Stuyvesant Town area last year, was sentenced this week to a prison term of 18 years to life.
Martinez, 40, cornered his first victim on Nov. 22, last year in the elevator of Peter Cooper Village. On Dec. 2 he robbed a woman at the point of an ice pick while she was with her 3-year-old son in a Stuyvesant Town building. Later than day he held up a woman with two small children in an E. 14th St. building. A half-hour later he followed another woman into another E. 14th St. building, but she refused to step into the elevator with him. At his sentencing, Martinez told the court, “I never meant to rob them. I thought I was robbing my mom.” He apologized to the victims, adding he one day hopes to get help.
Soho bag grab
A visitor from Virginia Beach put her bag on the ground at her feet while trying on jewelry at a street vendor’s stand at Spring St. and Broadway around 5:15 p.m. Sat., Dec. 10. She told police she didn’t see who made off with the bag.
Catches laptop thieves
Police arrested Jerome MacDonald, 19, and a 15-year-old girl for breaking into a Stuyvesant Town apartment and stealing a laptop computer on Friday afternoon Dec. 2. The victim returned home as the suspects were walking down the hall and apprehended them with the laptop. Police said the girl bit the victim’s hand when he stopped her.
Stands by her man
Transit police who were arresting a fare beater at the turnstiles in the I.N.D. subway station at West Fourth St. and Sixth Ave. during the early hours of Sun., Dec. 11, arrested his girlfriend, Meghan Cass, 33, after she said, “You’re not taking him,” and tackled one of the arresting officers. Cass was charged with obstructing government administration.
Threatens driver
Bryan Vetell, 34, was charged with extortion around 4 a.m. Sat., Dec. 10, when he demanded $100 from a New Jersey woman, 25, sitting in her car parked at the curb on the northeast corner of Greenwich and Vandam Sts. Vertell banged on the car’s hood but the victim refused to get out and called police.
Bad gamble
Sephoen Tsang, 22, was indicted on Fri., Dec. 9, for stealing more than $240,000 from the Chase branch at 221 Canal St. near Baxter St. on Tues., Nov. 29, according to the Manhattan district attorney. Tsang made several false computer entries to cover the theft. He left a note apologizing to the bank manager at the end of the day. Tsang was arrested Fri., Dec. 2, at Borgata Casino in Atlantic City while playing baccarat.
Greenhouse effect
Greenhouse, the club at 150 Varick St., was the scene of a brawl early on Sun., Dec. 11, and the theft of a patron’s bag during the early hours of Wed., Dec. 7.
A patron, 24, told police that he was punched and hit with a bottle when he got in the middle of six men who were brawling in the club around 3 a.m. Sunday.
A Soho man, 51, told police he was talking to some women at the bar around 2 a.m. Wed., Dec. 7, and discovered an hour later that his bag, which he had placed on the floor at his feet, had been stolen.
Albert Amateau
