A suspicious blue car with a faded license plate. A mysterious pink spray-painting near a historic monument. A rogue skateboard ramp at Mitchell Park. A mulch fire. And, in Mattituck, a goggle-wearing high school senior sprinting through the streets insisting he was being followed — all part of another unusually colorful week in Southold Town police reports.
‘Faded’ plates
May 18 – Around 8 a.m., a Pipes Neck Rd. resident in Greenport West contacted police to report a ‘suspicious’ blue vehicle w a ‘faded’ N.Y. license plate, parked at the end of the road, without a Southold Town beach permit, according to a police report. The resident described the driver as a male in his 40s. When police arrived, the vehicle was gone. The resident, who made a similar complaint about a blue car parked at the end of the road earlier this month, requested extra patrols in the area.
Around 2:30 p.m., police received a call about alleged illegal dumping at the Southold Town Transfer Station on Cox Lane. An investigation is pending, according to a police report.
‘Get off of me!’
May 19 – Around 6: 30 a.m., police were called to a hotel on Main St. in Greenport, by a guest who said he heard someone yelling “get off of me!,” in the hotel room next to his. The guest met police outside the hotel. The occupant of the hotel room next door told police that “she was not screaming, and it was the sound of the television that had been turned up loud at the time. She consented to allow police to canvass the room for any other occupants, and they found only her pet dog, according to a police report.
Around 8 a.m., police received a call from a Greenport West woman, who said she couldn’t drive through the intersection of 7th St. and Wiggins St. in Greenport because of ferry traffic. When police arrived, the woman had been able to get through the intersection, but suggested installing Stop signs on that corner.
Around 2: 30 p.m., police were called to Mitchell Park for a report of someone building a skateboarding ramp in the park. Responding officers canvassed the area without success, and dismantled the ramp, according to a police report.
May 21 – Around 2:30 p.m., police received a FLOCK camera notification of a stolen license plates. An officer located the vehicle and initiated a traffic stop. The car’s owner told police he had reported his license plate stolen to the NYPD last fall. The driver, a 39-year-old Bronx man, was advised to get new license plates to avoid being pulled over in the future.
Around 4 p.m., a Florida man arrived at police headquarters to surrender ‘old ammunition’ found at a residence on Rose Lane in Mattituck. The ammunition was inventoried and and secured in a police property room.
May 22 – Around 9 a.m., a Laurel resident arrived at police headquarters to turn in a black Apple MacBook Pro that he found near the corner of Sound Ave. and Aldrich Lane in Laurel. Due to “severe damage,” police were unable to obtain any information about the laptop’s owner. The device was inventoried in a police property room, according to a report.
‘Hot pink spray paint’
Also around 9 a.m., police received a report that someone had “marked a historical monument with hot pink spray paint” near the Cutchogue Village Green. A responding officer “observed a possible surveyor or NYS Highway Dept. possibly conducting work in the area and mark[ing] multiple property line markers as well. Police contacted the state highway dept., which wasn’t immediately aware of the situation but said they would look into it, according to a police report.
Around 10 a.m., police were again called to Mitchell Park for reports of a group fishing off the pier. The group of four, all from Brooklyn and Queens, possessed valid state fishing licenses, but were advised that the pier is private property.
Around 10:30 a.m., a Southold man contacted police to report individuals drinking alcohol and littering in the Adams St. parking lots in Greenport. Responding officers found only “numerous empty alcoholic beverages in the area.”
Around 11:30 a.m., police were called to the Southold Free Library, where a vehicle was parked “directly in front of the municipal parking lot across from the … library.” Efforts to reach the owner were unsuccessful, and the vehicle was ticketed.
Around 1:30 p.m., police were called to the intersection of Old Sound Ave. and Route 48, for a report of a motor vehicle accident. According to a report, a 77-year-old Mattituck woman was approaching a solid green light at the intersection, but was blocked from proceeding by a car stopped in the intersection. The Mattituck woman apparently honked her horn, and the driver of the stopped vehicle, a 36-year-old Greenport West man, allegedly got out of his car, approached the woman’s vehicle, and “slammed his fist on the hood of her vehicle,” according to a police report. “During the process of exiting [his] vehicle, he had put the vehicle in neutral and his vehicle rolled back into [the woman’s] vehicle, causing minor damage.” The Greenport West man, who was reached by phone in Riverhead, “denied all claims of hitting [the woman’s] car with his fist and did not realize his vehicle rolled into” it. He told police he exited his vehicle “to see why [the woman] was blowing her horn at him.”
Around 5:45 p.m., police and Mattituck firefighters were called to a home on Peconic Bay Blvd. in Laurel, for a report of a possible electrical fire. Upon arrival, firefighters determined that the fire was “caused by the mulch spontaneously combusting and not from a wire that was going to an outside camera.” The firefighters watered down the mulch as a precaution.
May 23 – Around 5:30 a.m., police and firefighters responded to the Southold Town Transfer Station, after two payloaders and a truck were on fire and “fully involved.”
‘Assassin’
Around 9:30 p.m., police received a report of a young male in swimming goggles, running and yelling that he is being followed, in the area of Factory Ave. in Mattituck. A responding officer located the young man, who explained that he was a Mattituck High School senior, participating in a “senior assassin” game with his friends. He was advised to stay out of the roadway and out of people’s private property, according to a police report.
May 24 – Around 5 p.m., police were called to the home of a Cutchogue man, who told them that earlier that day, he had been approached by a former friend with whom he had previously had a falling out, and that the former friend stated “we need to talk about you communicating with my wife … on social media.” The Cutchogue man said the former friend did not make any threats, but that he wanted the incident documented.
All individuals named in police reports are presumed innocent unless proven guilty in a court of law. Charges may be reduced, dismissed or result in an acquittal.