Source: Google Maps
Anne Cohen, the mother who was stabbed by her son earlier this week, had apparently been trying to flee the city to get away from him for a long time.
She was scared of her son, Richard Cohen, and had often mentioned moving to Florida or North Carolina, according to a friend.
Richard stabbed his mother in the torso and neck.and is currently jailed without bail.
Source: Michael LoCascio via Wikimedia Commons
Police found a dead body floating in the water near Exit 3 off the Belt Parkway, five days after a man jumped from the Verrazano Bridge.
He was found unresponsive. When the emergency services team arrived, he was declared dead. The man has not yet been identified, however, police believe he may be the man that jumped Friday morning.
Police believe that the man abandoned his car on the Staten Island-bound side of the Verrazano’s lower level at about 11:40 a.m.
No motive has been released.
The suicide is just one in a string of several suicides in the past few months, according to SILive.com.
Source: Google Maps
Two Brooklyn landlords were indicted yesterday in the deaths of five tenants after a fire broke out at an apartment building they owned. The fire was set off by an arsonist and swept through the building in January of 2010.
The landlords, Vasilios Gerazounis and his son Argyrios, illegally subdivided the building at 2033 86th Street, converting the second floor to two apartments, and the third floor to four, according to the New York Daily News. The conversion blocked off several life-saving fire exits.
Later, other illegal conversions were also discovered in a nearby property owned by the defendants.
“Although the arsonist is responsible for setting the fire, he does not shoulder the blame alone,” Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said in a statement. “The landlords share in the responsibility for each of the five deaths and the injuries. They owned, maintained, and made money from a building with illegal subdivisions that blocked tenants’ ability to escape in a deadly fire.”
The father and son were indicted on charges of manslaughter, reckless endangerment and one count of assault. They plead not guilty. If convicted, they’ll serve up to 25 years in prison.
Source: Google Maps
A worker in the Shore Haven Apartments at 2056 Cropsey Avenue in Bath Beach fell down an elevator shaft Monday morning.
The victim, a 57-year-old man, sustained head injuries after the four story fall.
He was transported to Lutheran Medical Center with serious head trauma.
The Department of Buildings is investigating the incident, according to DNAinfo.com.
Photo by Bob De Thomas
A 51-year-old man was found dead yesterday in the Belt Parkway rest area near 4th Avenue, adjacent to the Verrazano Bridge, in what appears to be a suicide.
Police responded to a call of an unconscious male shortly after 3:00 p.m., turning up to find the man in a black Ford Windstar.
EMS declared the man dead on arrival, having suffered a gunshot wound to the head from a .25-caliber semi-automatic firearm, which they found on the floor of the vehicle. Authorities draped a white sheet over the car’s windshield, and used NYPD vehicles to block the view from the hundreds of joggers, cyclists and others enjoying the Shore Parkway Greenway.
Police were on scene as late as 9:30 p.m. The Medical Examiner was also on scene, and one reader tells Bensonhurst Bean that there appeared to be an NYPD Harbor Unit searching the waters around the Brooklyn tower of the Verrazano Bridge.
The Medical Examiner has not formally ruled the death to be a suicide, and an NYPD spokesperson said the investigation is ongoing.
Thanks to Bob De Thomas for the tip.
Source: @NYC911/Twitter
Yusef Hawkins (l) and Treyvon Martin (r)
In the aftermath of Trayvon Martin’s death, many are left wondering how far our country has actually gone in terms of racial equality.
Lee Sustar of the Indypendent recently wrote about the 1989 Bensonhurt murder of 16-year-old African American youth Yusef Hawkins, as an example of a legacy of racial profiling.
For those who need a memory jolt, Hawkins had gone to Bensonhurst with two friends to purchase a used car. A group of local Italian-American youths had assumed that Hawkins was part a gang. They chased and beat Hawkins and his friends and Hawkins was shot in the chest.
Most of the members of the mob that attacked Hawkins were tried, including the two leaders. Joseph Fama, who pulled the trigger, was convicted of second degree murder while others received minor punishments and acquittals.
The light sentencing sparked protests throughout the neighborhood, led by the Reverend Al Sharpton.
George Zimmerman, Trayvon’s killer, is still under investigation. Unlike Fama, Zimmerman may have the law on his side, specifically Florida’s controversial homicide self-defense provision, “stand your ground.”
What do you think – does the murder of Trayvon echo racially-motivated murders of the past, including the 1989 death of Hawkins? Is Yusef Hawkins Bensonhurst’s Trayvon Martin?
Bedford Avenue, near Avenue V (Source: Google Maps)
A man was found with a gunshot wound to the head yesterday in his basement apartment on Bedford Avenue near Avenue V in Sheepshead Bay.
The victim’s wife walked in on him lying face down, after she returned from an errand. The Daily News is reporting that the woman was sent on the errand by her husband.
Police are currently are trying to determine if the wound was self-inflicted or the work of an assailant. The man was reportedly rushed to Coney Island hospital and is in critical condition, although the News’ headline refers to the incident as a fatal shooting.
For more details, as well as any updates, please see our sister site Sheepshead Bites.
Billy Kramer (Source: Facebook)
The grisly death of a 33-year-old man who plummeted off a Coney Island apartment building yesterday morning is an “apparent suicide,” the New York Police Department told Bensonhurst Bean this morning.
Source: Alen M./Facebook
A man fell to his death from the roof of a Coney Island apartment building, shortly before noon today.
The above photo began circulating on Facebook about an hour ago. The man landed in the courtyard of Trump Village Building 5 at West 5th and Neptune Avenue.
A Facebook commenter who claims to have been the first on the scene said the victim lived in Building 4 and was 33 years old.
Commenters believe the incident was a suicide, but Sheepshead Bites is awaiting confirmation from the police department.
Reader Elina N., who lives across the street from the incident, texted Bensonhurst Bean at 11:30 a.m. this morning, writing, “I heard a loud thump outside my window and realized someone just might have jumped out the window and died across the street from me.”
Facebook user Steven B. writes: “crazy thing is we get about 1 jumper a year on average..”
This is a breaking news story and may contain inaccuracies. The article will be updated as more information becomes available.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Kids, don’t try this at the train station.
With a recent video of a man surfing the J train, there is worry that copycats inspired by the video will engage in the same ridiculous and reckless antics, according to Metro NY.
“If there’s one copycat that hurt themselves, I wouldn’t be able to deal with it,” said Erik, a self-proclaimed expert of train surfing who has quit the sport, in the Metro article. “It’s just stupid.”
Danger, adrenaline, and that bottomless well of Darwinist fuel – stupidity – all converge in the form of train surfing. But, of course, the risk of severe injuries or death is hardly enough to persuade teens to stop thinking these hulking masses of steel speeding through dark tunnels at more than 60 miles per hour is anything other than a jumble gym.
If that were the case – if history had any effect on how some adolescents behave – then the case of Billy Quinn and Cory Hammerstone ought to have put an end to subway surfing more than 10 years ago. Bensonhurst residents Quinn and Hammerstone were two 15-year-old boys found dead at the Bay Parkway subway station in 2000. They were riding on top of the N train when they were both struck by a beam that hung near the entrance of the station. One bloody body was found sprawled out on the platform; the other on the tracks.
The N train, apparently, isn’t the only favorite for subway surfers in Southern Brooklyn. Erik, the expert, mentions that the best subway lines to surf are the “F and the B in Brooklyn, because the elevated trains make for brilliant views.”
Brilliant, indeed.
