PILFERING PADDY’S
Investigators working the Downtown beat recorded no less than five major thefts related to St. Patrick’s Day frivolity on March 17, as crooks took advantage of the good-natured merry making of Irish-for-a-day bar hoppers to make off with their pots of gold — and iPhones.
The day’s first victim reported that she was at a South William Street watering hole near Mill Lane at 11:15 a.m., when a thief snatched her designer Coach purse off the back of her chair, along with the ritzy iPhone 7, wallet and $50 in cash it contained.
At 3 p.m., a 29-year-old man told police he was partying it up on at a Stone Street pub between Coenties Alley and William Street, when he felt someone bump into him as the festivities were ramping up.
When the man went to pay his bill, he discovered his wallet was gone, his bank later informed that the crook had taken his credit cards to a Prince Street Apple Store and purchased $12,306 worth of electronics.
A few hours later, a 41-year-old woman told police she was inside a Water Street tavern near Broad Street at 5 p.m., when a thief made off with a bag she’d stuffed behind a bench containing cash, credit cards, and an monthly MTA pass worth $117.
At a Battery Place oyster bar on Pier A at 9:30 p.m., a 27-year-old woman had hung her $400 Michael Kors purse on the back of a bar stoll when she stepped away for a moment, before returning a few minutes later to find her designer purse and Samsung cellphone were missing, cops said.
The final theft police recorded also occurred on Battery Place at 10:30 p.m., when some reprobate snuck into the back room of a bar and grabbed a workers bag, which contained more than $2,000 worth of laptops, clothes, cash, and iPhone accessories, according to police.
BOTTLE OPENER
Cops are hunting the thug who cracked a bottle over a woman’s head inside a subway station bathroom on Broadway on March 17.
The victim told police she was inside the underground loo near John Street at 7:15 a.m., when she was engaged in an argument with her attacker.
The disagreement reached its climax with the goon took a glass bottle and broke it over the woman’s head, the woman claimed.
Curiously, investigators were unable to turn up an evidence of a bottle at the crime scene, and the victim had no injuries, despite complaining of substantial pain, cops said.
SHOE THING
Cops busted two employees of a Vesey Street fashion retailer whose alleged scheming netted them more than $5,000 worth of ill-gotten merchandise since Jan. 17.
A rep for the store told police that the suspects colluded to use the store’s Fed Ex pickups to ship thousands worth of store merchandise — including Lou Boutin and Fend shoes, along with a Balmain shirt — to multiple locations without permission.
SHARP KIDS
Cops are hunting two knife-wielding teens who held up a boy on North End Avenue on March 11.
The victim told police he was near Murray Street on his way home from a house party at 10:45 p.m. when the suspects pulled a knife on him and demanded his stuff, which included $1,200 pair of “Black Yeezy” sneakers and $600, cops said.
HOT PRODUCT
A man stole a small fortune worth of makeup from a John Street drug store on March 7.
Surveillance footage shows the crook waltzing into the pharmacy between Broadway and Nassau Street at 4:34 p.m., when he proceeded to clean out a shelf of makeup valued at $1,168, before waltzing past the register with his ill-gotten beauty products.
STICKY FINGERS
A pickpocket snatched a wallet from a woman’s handbag on Laight Street on Feb. 11.
The victim told police that she was on her way into a building between Washington and Greenwich streets at 11 a.m. when, without thinking much of it, she felt another passerby bump into her.
It was only later that the victim realized her handbag was open and her wallet missing, along with the $200 and credit cards it contained.
— Colin Mixson
