By Karen Zautyk
KEARNY –
A 22-year-old man was robbed at gunpoint Thursday afternoon on Dukes St. near Chestnut St., police reported.
Police Chief John Dowie said the crime likely occurred between 4 and 5 p.m. A more precise time could not be provided because the victim, rather than calling from the scene, came into police headquarters to report it.
Dowie said the victim told police he had been walking up Dukes toward Chestnut when he was accosted by two men, one of them with a gun. They pushed him into a doorway and relieved him of more than $200 in cash and his BlackBerry. As they fled the scene, they ordered him to stay in the doorway, which he did for several minutes.
The gunman was described as a light-skinned, heavy-set Hispanic, approximately 20 years old.
Det. Ray Lopez and Sgt. John View are conducting the investigation and have been able to ID one of the suspects, Dowie reported. A warrant for his arrest has been issued.
• • • • •
Our other Kearny police news begins with a quiz: If you had a purse full of pot and you had dropped it during a melee, would you: a) leave it where it is and hope the cops didn’t notice it? or b) ask one of the nice policemen to fetch it for you?
If you answered “b” you may be the 19-year-old Kearny woman arrested Saturday, Oct. 15, for disorderly conduct — and on drug charges.
At 3:30 a.m., Officers Derek Hemphill and Ben Wuelfing responded to a report of a fight at Davis and Garfield Aves. They arrived to find people screaming out windows and pointing to the location of the fracas, Dowie said.
The cops separated the three male combatants, one of whom was bleeding from the nose, and asked their female onlooker, who was shouting in the street, to cease and desist. She reportedly would not.
She did, however, communicate to Officer Hemphill that she had dropped her pocketbook somewhere on the street and asked him to try to find it. Which he did. The property was returned to her, but she was taken into custody for disorderly conduct, Dowie noted.
The purse, now in police possession and reportedly “reeking of marijuana,” was allegedly found to contain a large bag of the drug, along with a driver’s license that did not belong to the arrestee.
She was booked at headquarters on the disorderly count and on charges of possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia and released on a summons. However, police are doing a follow-up investigation to determine whose ID she had.
The brawlers did cease and desist when asked to, medical assistance was provided to the one with the nosebleed, and they were sent on their way. Apparently, none of them had been carrying a purse.
• • • • •
Another Kearny woman, this one 21, was “busted” for drugs last Wednesday night at the gas station at Oakwood and Kearny Aves.
P.O. Michael Andrews, on patrol at 8:10 p.m., saw a car veer into oncoming traffic on Oakwood and then pull into the station. A female passenger alighted and headed for the mini-mart, while apparently stuffing something down her blouse.
The driver, also a 21-year-old Kearny woman, rolled down the window, and the officer reportedly smelled the odor of marijuana in the vehicle. When the passenger returned, he confronted her about what she might be hiding, and she reached into her bra and produced a bag of pot, the chief said.
The driver was issued a summons for erratic operation of a motor vehicle. The passenger, who police said turned over two more bags of marijuana at headquarters, was charged with possession of the drug and of paraphernalia. The Observer does not know where the other two bags had been hidden.
• • • • •
At 9:10 p.m. last Thursday, Officers Richard Carbone and Giovanni Rodriguez were traveling south on the Pulaski Skyway when they saw a vehicle drifting from lane to lane. To protect other traffic, they pulled their patrol car to the center of the highway and rode the middle with their lights on, finally stopping the erratic motorist when he exited in Newark.
The driver, a 37-year-old Morristown man, reportedly failed the field sobriety tests and was taken to headquarters on a DWI charge. There, Dowie said, the motorist became confrontational and warned the officers that they had made a very bad decision because “he knew people.”
After six failed attempts to get him to blow into the alcohol-test apparatus, police said, a charge of refusing to take the breath test was added to his slate, along with a summons for careless operation of a motor vehicle.
The vehicle, a 2011 BMW, was impounded.
• • • • •
At 11:10 p.m. Thursday, Officers Tom Sumowski and Dean Gasser responded to a deli at Afton St. and Belgrove Drive after a neighbor reported hearing a banging noise at the rear of the store. The officers said no entry had been gained, but an attempt had been made to smash in the door. The thief had discarded his tools — a sledgehammer, a handsaw and a knife — in the yard. The suspect seen fleeing was described as a black male wearing a black hoodie and black hat. Det. Ray Lopez in conducting the ongoing investigation.
