CRIME BLOTTER

A Post-Convention Bounce

A POST-CONVENTION BOUNCE…of crime! Much was being made early last week about the latest "astonishing" drop in crime across the city—this time for the duration of the convention. We don't buy it for a second, but even if it were true, come Labor Day local ne'er-do-wells were itching to get back to business.

Brooklyn meanies anxious to get a jump on things staged a little wee-hours gang fight on a Lefferts Gardens streetcorner, leaving one 16-year-old dead of a stab wound and two others injured. The action then moved to Flatbush, where two more people were wounded in gunfights, and East Flatbush, where another man was shot.

Over in Park Slope, a man in his 50s waiting for a train at the 7th Ave. station dropped his cigarettes onto the tracks. Remembering how much those things cost, he hopped down onto the tracks to retrieve them, only to be fatally surprised by a Q train. (We were wondering why the trains were so slow that morning.)

Back in East Flatbush, a man was shot and stabbed multiple times while strolling with his gal, and a 26-year-old sitting on his stoop with friends was shot several times by two men who were passing by.

Meanwhile, the West Indian Parade brought joy to millions.

About 4 p.m. that afternoon, an off-duty garbage man with something on his mind stopped by an NYPD stationhouse on the Lower East Side. Once there, Dale Jackson, 38, started acting a little funny in the head. But he didn't make his big mistake until he was leaving the station, at which point he grabbed an orange traffic cone and began waving it about in a threatening manner. Fearing for their safety as well as the safety of the public at large, cops tackled the cone-wielding maniac, who was later charged with assault, menacing and disorderly conduct.

A 22-year-old Staten Island man was leaving a deli at 5:30 a.m. Labor Day morning, when a stranger approached him, threatened to shoot him, then just stabbed him in the shoulder instead. You'd think the kid would be grateful, but apparently not.

A newfound vigilance on the part of tellers and the NYPD when it comes to dealing with bank robbers has forced would-be Dillingers to try a new tack—hitting businesses you'd never, ever think to rob. It's a trend that seems to have caught on especially big in the Bronx. Two weeks ago it was a carpet store. A few weeks before that, a bowling alley. And the day after Labor Day, it was a stationery store. Who'd ever think you'd get a decent haul at a stationery store? Well, the three masked gunmen who hit the place on E. 187th St. did, and got away with a cigar box containing $9000!

Along those same lines, a thief walked into a Kips Bay optician's office early Tuesday evening. Instead of demanding cash, however, the bandit just wanted expensive eyeglass frames. He escaped with several pairs and an employee's cellphone. Believe it or not, that's the second eyeglass-frame robbery in three weeks. o