STRANGERS ASSAULT MAN ON STREET AFTER ARGUMENT
On Saturday, Jan. 26, a 34-year-old man reported that he was walking near East 82nd Street when four or five suspects bumped into him. After an exchange of words, the suspects circled him and started to beat him, causing lacerations to their victim’s eye. The man walked to the hospital himself, and called police. But he had left the hospital by the time the police arrived. The case has been closed, although no arrests have been made.

THIS IS A STICKUP!
On the afternoon of Jan. 28, an unknown man entered a bank on Third Avenue and walked up to the teller window. He pushed a note under the window that said, “Don’t be stupid, just give me $100s, $50s and $20s.” The bank teller gave $1,800 to the perpetrator, who then exited the bank, fleeing down 88th Street. Surveillance footage is available.

INTERNET HACKING CASE
A 31-year-old woman who lives on East 63rd Street reported that her bank account was accessed remotely on Jan. 25, and $8,000 was removed from her account. After calling her bank, investigators traced the account activity to the woman’s workplace address. The theft occurred sometime between Jan. 2 and Jan. 25. Chase knows the recipient of the money, but will not disclose it at this time. The woman closed all of her accounts. No arrests have been made.

MEN ARRESTED FOR CELLPHONE THEFT
A 33-year-old man reported that in the middle of the night on Jan. 25, he was walking down East 85th Street when two men approached him and asked for the time. The two unknown men walked away, then started to circle back. The man walked into a deli to avoid them, and after he exited, the two perpetrators confronted him. One said, “Don’t freak out.” Their victim tried to back away, but the assailants punched and kicked him. One of the men took away his victim’s iPhone. Both attackers were arrested for robbery.

INTOXICATED MAN BEATEN AND ROBBED OF PHONE
Late at night on Jan. 30, a 33-year-old man was returning home from a night of carousing. He was approached by two unknown men on East 79th Street and shoved to the ground, where they repeatedly kicked and punched him. The assailants then removed their victim’s phone from his pocket and fled the scene. There were no cameras on the street. The victim described his assailants as two white men: one, bearded and about 5’8”, wearing a dark hat, and the other about the same height and bald. The Blackberry phone, worth $250, has not been recovered.

Bless This Theft
A 64-year old woman who only spoke Chinese was approached by three young women on Canal Street who told the victim that she needed to have her money and jewelry blessed to ward off evil spirits. The victim, amazingly, brought all her cash and 23 pieces of gold jewelry, worth a whopping $60,000 in all, to a location they specified on White Street. While there, the thieves supposedly blessed her valuables, but really swiped them out of her bag and replaced them with newspapers and a bottle of water. The perpetrators then had the audacity to tell the unsuspecting woman to wait a week before opening the bag, at which point she reported the crime to police.

Designer Handbag Theft
Some crimes take a lot of effort and teamwork. Three people recently stole a $1,295 handbag from a designer store on Spring Street. In the heist, a female team member first went into the store and, while perusing the wares, casually moved the bag to one side of a display table and promptly left the store. After the woman left, a fellow thief—this time a man—came in and picked up the purse. Police are also looking for a third male suspect in the crime, but it is unclear what role he played in this group theft.

Be Cautious When You Eat Lunch
We’ve heard of dine and dash, but not this way. A 25-year-old woman eating lunch in a restaurant on Fifth Avenue had her wallet stolen right behind her back, as her purse was slung over her chair. The thief stole a number of cards and items from her purse, worth a total of $1,515, and charged $1,300 on her credit cards.

A similar incident occurred a day before, when a 49-year-old woman was having lunch in a downtown café and her wallet was stolen from her purse, which was on the back of her chair. When she called her credit card company to report it, they informed the woman that the thief had already spent $2,450 at a retail store.

Yet Another iTheft
Earlier this month, a 31-year-old woman was standing in front of a coffee shop on West Houston Street with a friend when two women attacked her, stealing the victim’s iPhone, worth around $500, then fleeing in a car. Police say the victim’s shoulder was bruised in the attack and she had a few scratches on her body.

Two-Wheeled iTheft
Even keeping your bag on you can’t guarantee it won’t be stolen. As a 33-year-old woman was walking up West Broadway, a thief riding by on his bike managed to reach out and grab her bag. The sack contained a $1,200 Macbook Air laptop, an iPad 2 worth $499 and prescription medication, totaling $1,849 in stolen goods

A Shopper’s Wallet Goes Missing
When we go shopping, we expect to spend most of our money ourselves, but this wasn’t the case for a 39-year-old woman who was recently shopping downtown. The woman told police that while looking at clothes at a store, she absentmindedly left her wallet in her shopping cart. She noticed her wallet was missing when she went to check out. Thankfully, no charges were made on her cards before she cancelled them.

Costumed Capers
When the regular old black ski mask doesn’t do the trick, some criminals turn to costumes for their illegal antics. Two men in their forties, who were posing as police officers, pushed a 24-year-old man against a wall. As one removed his wallet, the other acted as a lookout at the Canal Street subway station in Soho. While one fled the scene on foot, the other was successfully arrested by police and the $40 that had been stolen out of the young man’s wallet was returned.

Cell Phone Theft
As a 17-year-old man was standing on the corner of South and Whitehall streets, when two 18-year-old men jumped him. One of them kicked the man to the ground, while the other took his $500 Blackberry. The pair walked away, leaving the victim with injuries to one eye and scrapes on the back of his neck and elbows.

Purse Snatch
A 33-year-old woman was taking a midnight stroll on the way to her East 90th Street home Tuesday morning when three women attacked her, knocking her to the ground in front of 303 E. 90th St. The three fled with the woman’s pink purse, containing her $220 iPhone, her New York State identification cards, credit cards from HSBC and Chase banks and an American Express card. None of the items were recovered.

Duane Reade Debacle
Pregnancy tests were only some of the items two men made off with when they robbed a Duane Reade store on Second Avenue on Sunday at 3 a.m. They made out with $10,747 worth of items from the store, also snatching cigarettes, Motrin, Aleve, Advil and condoms. Police are looking for a 5-foot-10 man who was wearing beige jeans and a black T-shirt at the time of the incident and a 5-foot-9 man who was wearing a green hat and blue jeans.

Taxi Attack
A taxi driver was dropping a passenger off on the northeast corner of Second Avenue and East 89th Street on Saturday at 1:15 p.m. when, out of nowhere, someone struck a blow to his face. Police describe the attacker as a black man with a small Afro who was driving a red hatchback car. The taxi driver suffered a small laceration on his mouth.

Punch and Run
A man who saw his girlfriend get punched in the face by another young woman was probably not expecting the catfight he was witnessing to turn into a physical assault. The couple confronted a 24-year-old woman in an adjacent apartment with a noise complaint in the East 83rd Street residential building Sunday, according to the police report. The verbal dispute escalated to an unexpected assault when the perpetrator proceeded to hit the 33-year-old female victim across the face, resulting in a small gash on the victim’s forehead. The woman who threw the punch fled in an unknown direction. The victim required medical attention when police arrived on the scene.

Thief in Disguise
A robber who impersonated an electric utility worker to enter an apartment Sunday morning stole a lock off a storage trunk—but nothing from inside the trunk. According to the police report, the perpetrator entered the apartment of an 80-year-old woman who does not speak English under the guise of checking the volt meters in her East 83rd Street residence. The fake electrician broke the lock—described by police as an antique Asian lock valued at $50—and stole it, damaging the trunk but leaving its contents undisturbed. There was no description of the perpetrator in the police report and the stolen property has not been recovered.

Apartment Robbery
When a 21-year-old woman answered a knock on her door to two unfamiliar men, it became immediately apparent that they were there to rob her. “Give me the money, this is a stickup,” one of the perpetrators informed her. The men pushed their way into her East 65th Street apartment Monday, using weapons to subdue the victim when she fought back, according to the police report. One of the perpetrators struck the victim on her forehead with a gun, while the other stabbed her with a box cutter, inflicting wounds on her forearm and upper thigh. The men, who wore jeans and baseball caps, fled on foot, taking only a Blackberry cell phone. The victim hailed a cab to the hospital to seek treatment.