Allen Park
Vehicle varnished
A vehicle was vandalized earlier this month in the 17000 block of Keppen.
The owner left it in her driveway about 9 p.m. July 5 and found it covered in varnish about 6:30 a.m. July 6. Both driver’s-side tires were punctured.
Damage is estimated at $1,200. The resident came into the station about 11:15 a.m. Wednesday to report the incident and forwarded pictures of the damage to detectives.
Cigarettes stolen through shattered gas station window
Employees arrived at the Marathon gas station, 10955 Allen Road, about 7 a.m. July 11 to find the front store window smashed out.
Blood was visible on several different items, and $195 cash and about $850 worth of cigarettes were stolen.
Another employee had closed the station at 1 a.m. July 11 and left exactly $200 in the register.
Officers were called back to the gas station about 10:30 a.m. when a customer tried to pay with a bloody $5 bill. Only two customers – a 5-foot 4-inch middle-aged white woman and a 6-foot 3-inch black man who looked about 30 years old with a husky build – had paid for merchandise with a $5 bill earlier in the day.
The bloody bill was tagged as evidence. The store owner said he planned to replace the broken window with bulletproof glass, as it previously was the only window with regular glass.
Dearborn
Burglar strikes big at auto shop
An estimated $150,000 in tools and auto repair supplies were stolen between July 10 and 12 from Eastborn Collision, 5410 Oakman.
The shop manager told police he locked the shop about 2 p.m. July 10 and discovered the burglary when he went to open up about 9 a.m. July 12. Among the items missing were three toolboxes containing miscellaneous tools, two in-car navigation systems and a paint mixing system.
Dearborn Heights
Owner calms aggressive pit bull on the loose
Police on July 9 cited an 18-year-old man for having an unlicensed pit bull and for allowing it to escape after officers witnessed the dog charging people near Jackson and Powers.
An officer who was responding to another call in the area reported watching the 1-year-old dog charge at two people who were walking by. Dispatch informed the officer that the dog’s owner lived in the 20000 block of Powers; police were able to locate the man there.
The man said he let the dog out earlier into his fenced backyard, and that it must have escaped somehow. He said he thought his mother had registered the dog, but police found out otherwise and issued the man a ticket. Police said the dog became friendly once in the presence of its owner.
Identity thief makes sexy purchases
A man residing in the 6600 block of Kingsbury told police that between July 7 and 9, someone used his credit card to rack up $600 in fraudulent charges at a lingerie retailer’s Website.
Three separate charges for $200 each were found on the man’s bank statement, he said. He never gave the credit card information to anyone else to use, he told police, adding that the company indicated it would provide shipping information for the purchases if contacted by police.
Lincoln Park
Jewelry, cash taken from house
A house in the 800 block of Winchester was robbed Monday, but the resident didn’t realize it at first.
She told police she was out from 9:45 a.m to 3 p.m., and that a couple of hours later she noticed a mattress in a spare bedroom had been moved off the box spring and onto the floor.
Two gold necklaces jointly valued at $100 were missing, as were 20 pairs of earrings collectively valued at $300. Cash totaling $400 was missing from a drawer.
No signs of forced entry were found.
Boys ride off with ballplayers’ bikes
Bicycles belonging to two boys playing baseball were stolen last Sunday in the area of Montie and Austin.
The boys said four boys ages 12 to 16 rode up on two bikes. Two of them were riding on the backs of the bikes and jumped off to take the ballplayers’ bikes before fleeing north on Austin.
Police found one of the suspects, a 15-year-old Ecorse boy, sitting on a bike in the area of Annabell and Outer Drive, but it did not belong to either of the ballplayers. The bike the suspect was sitting on also had been reported stolen, police said, and officers then detained the boy.
All of the suspects were described as black and wearing long white T-shirts and dark shorts. Two bikes not belonging to the victims were recovered, and the detained boy’s mother was notified.
Melvindale
Hydraulic jack and tools stolen from basement
A hydraulic jack and some tools were stolen from a basement in the 17300 block of Eddon between 1:15 and 8 p.m. Monday while the resident was away.
She said she believes her ex-boyfriend, a 30-year-old Woodhaven resident, stole the tools, because although he does not have a key to the house, he knows how to climb through the back window. Her neighbor also saw her ex-boyfriend’s car, a silver Mazda, parked in her driveway from 3:30 to 4 p.m. July 12 while she was gone.
Tent taken from backyard
A tent was stolen last week from a backyard in the 18300 block of Reed.
Officers were called to the house about 4:15 p.m. Monday after a resident said she went to bed about 11 p.m. July 11 and woke up to find the tent gone.
Riverview
Lack of headlights gives away drunken driver
A patrolling officer about 1:45 a.m. July 9 saw a maroon 2000 Dodge exit Zorba’s Coney Island, 18327 Fort Street, and turn north with its headlights off.
The officer followed as it immediately turned east onto Voight and then stopped it. The driver, a 28-year-old former resident, whose parents lived nearby on Longsdorf, said he had left a local bar after having two beers. He then admitted to having four.
The man failed field sobriety tests and registered a blood-alcohol level of 0.122 percent in a breath test at about 2 a.m. The legal limit in Michigan is 0.08 percent.
About half an hour later after his arrest, tests showed levels of 0.16 percent and 0.15 percent.
Envelope with personal certificates taken from senior’s apartment
A 64-year-old resident reported on July 6 that a manila envelope containing four birth certificates, a marriage license, divorce papers, annulment papers and her father’s discharge papers was taken from her apartment in the 15000 block of Brookview sometime between February and July 4, when she realized the envelope was missing.
The woman said only two people have been inside her apartment since she last saw the envelope and no one else has a key to the apartment except her and apartment complex employees.
Southgate
Dog walker spots restaurant break-in
A woman walking her dog just before 6 a.m. last Sunday found that the glass front door had been broken at Famous Coney Island, 11205 Allen.
A large landscaping brick had been thrown through it. A cash register had been dumped onto the floor, and $100 was missing from inside it, the owner said.
Lawn equipment goes missing
Nearly $1,000 worth of lawn equipment was stolen between 3 a.m. and 5 p.m. July 9 from a garage in the 14600 block of Howard.
Police were unsure how entry was gained. The owner promised to provide them with a list of missing items.
Yard tools swiped from garage
Several items were stolen between 4 p.m. July 7 and 7 p.m. July 10 from a garage in the 12800 block of Plum.
Among them were a weed trimmer/edger valued at $160, a leaf blower ($50), a chain saw ($50) and a stepladder ($140).
No signs of forced entry were found, but a concrete block was found near a fence that may have been used to load the items outside the fence.
Trenton
Man swings bat at ex-husband’s van, family
Police were called just after midnight July 10 to the 2400 block of Fifth by a woman who said she had just been assaulted with a baseball bat.
She said she and her husband were in the process of dropping off his son at his ex-wife’s house. They stopped a few houses away, the caller said, fearing that a confrontation might take place.
When they arrived, the ex-wife’s boyfriend came running toward them with a black baseball bat in hand. They tried to drive away, she said, but the boyfriend swung the bat and broke out the rear driver’s-side window of their van.
Another of the husband’s sons, who was riding in the back seat, was struck by the bat, police said, and also suffered cuts on a finger and on his left arm from the broken glass.
The boyfriend denied wielding a bat, but after the ex-wife called a man she said was her lawyer, she surrendered a bat from her house to police, who confirmed it was the one used in the attack.
The boyfriend was arrested for felonious assault and malicious destruction of property.
Talking, laughter draw neighbor’s ire; assault charges ensue
A report of a woman pointing a gun at a group of children drew police to the 300 block of Cleveland just after noon Monday.
Officers secured the perimeter and began speaking to witnesses. One, a 16-year-old boy, said he and two friends were on his porch talking and laughing when a woman across the street emerged from her house and started yelling at them about trash that had been thrown in her yard.
The boy told police she was holding what appeared to be a long shotgun and pointing it at them, and that they all yelled for her go back inside. The boy’s mother heard the yelling and looked out to see the woman holding the gun, but said she did not see the woman point it at the children.
Assisted by U.S. Border Patrol personnel, police tried to negotiate with the woman, who refused to come to her front door. They then called her son and daughter, and about two hours later she opened the door.
Officers found a case containing a 20-gauge shotgun and two rounds of ammunition behind the door. The gun was not loaded, they said.
The woman denied pointing the gun at the children or even having it in her hand. Officers determined that she might have been mentally unstable and transported her to Oakwood Southshore Medical Center for evaluation.
Felonious assault charges are being sought.
Wyandotte
Prank caller found in clothes dryer
Officers were sent to the 400 block of Cedar about 4 a.m. Monday to speak to a 38-year-old man who had called the Lapeer County Sheriff’s Department several times that night, sending them to his wife’s house.
In one call, he said she had a shotgun and was going to kill herself. In another, he said the house was on fire and that he was out front.
Officers knocked for several minutes at the man’s house and could hear people inside. Five minutes later, a 15-year-old boy answered the door and appeared very nervous when questioned about the man’s whereabouts. After the boy allowed officers to enter the house and look around, they found the man hiding in a clothes dryer in the basement.
Taylor had a warrant out for the man for aggravated assault, domestic violence, along with a $2,500 bond. He was arrested and turned over to Taylor police.
Server’s money taken during final count
Money was stolen from a 24-year-old waitress July 11 at Sports Brew Pub, 166 Maple.
She said she was counting money atop the bar about 2 a.m. while a man who she thought was good friends with the owner sat at a nearby stool.
The waitress spread out the cash on the counter and stepped outside for a minute. When she returned, the stack of $20 bills was gone and the 34-year-old man, who was wearing a white button-up shirt with blue stripes and blue jeans, still was sitting at his stool.
The waitress asked him if he knew where the money was; he replied that he did not and then left.
Another patron approached the suspect outside the bar along with the waitress and several others. The second man emptied his pockets and asked the suspect to do the same. When the second man got close to the suspect, the suspect fled west through an alley toward Third Street.
While driving west on Maple, officers saw a man fitting the suspect’s description speaking with another officer in front of another bar. The man was sweating and had offered the officer in front of the bar $40 to take him to Riverview.
When questioned, the man initially said he had not been to Sports earlier in the evening, but then said he had been there. Upon being searched, $144 in cash was found in the man’s pocket.
While being taken in for booking, the suspect admitted to taking the money, but made up several excuses for doing so, saying the waitress left it out for him or that he was borrowing it.
A records check revealed outstanding warrants on the man for $500 out of Presque Isle County for child support and for $400 out of Huron Township on a traffic charge.
(Compiled by Chris Jackett, J. Patrick Pepper and Tom Tigani.)