Allen Park
Resident’s gold stash ransacked
Several gold jewelry items and a whiskey wrapper bag filled with $4,000 in $100 bills were stolen Monday from a house in the 9900 block of Hubert.
The resident had left for work about 6:15 a.m. and returned at 4:30 p.m. to find his video game console off the stand and on the couch. In his bedroom, all of the drawers were open and rummaged through.
Some items from the drawers were on his bed, but several were missing, including a gold necklace; two gold charms; three gold-toned watches, one with his name engraved on the back; and the bag of cash. The missing jewelry is valued at $750.
All doors were locked and closed, but access likely was gained through a bathroom window on the west side of the house.
Cops witness, solve car theft
An officer saw two Detroit residents, ages 19 and 44, stealing a red 1999 Ford Taurus about 2:15 p.m. Monday in the 3100 block of Fairlane Drive, near Target.
One drove the car and followed the other suspect, who was driving a white 1996 Chevrolet sport van. Police in two different patrol cars stopped each suspect’s vehicle.
The 19-year-old in the Taurus told them he couldn’t shut the car off because there were no keys. Various tools were on the passenger seat, and the car’s ignition was punched and damaged as if it had been hotwired.
Both suspects were arrested; the 19-year-old admitted to stealing the car.
Dearborn
Man arrested for having toy gun
Police arrested a paroled robber near Tireman and Anthony about 10:40 p.m. Oct. 11 for violating the city’s ordinance against carrying imitation handguns.
Officers were dispatched after a resident reported seeing a suspicious-looking man riding an adult tricycle with a pair of bolt cutters in his hands. Police said when they turned their flashers on, the man, 26, of Detroit, rode into a parking lot on Tireman and stopped next to a van. One officer stepped out of his car and heard a thud before the suspect walked toward him, the report said.
The officer looked to see what the sound was and found the imitation gun – which was missing the neon orange safety tip – underneath the van. The man then was arrested.
Gumball machine stolen
A gumball machine was stolen sometime overnight Oct. 8 from Dynamic Cleaners, 6476 Greenfield.
Police said a large piece of concrete was used to smash a window and gain entrance. Nothing else was reported stolen.
Dearborn Heights
Copper crooks strike church
About $11,000 worth of copper was stolen overnight on Oct. 8 from the exterior of Christus Victor Lutheran Church, 25535 Ford Road.
The church’s maintenance supervisor called police the following morning when he noticed the decorative trim caps – 11 in all – missing from the building’s massive trusses. A neighbor told police she heard some noise at the church about 4 a.m., but figured it was probably just the sprinkler system activating.
Burglars arrested at vacant house
Police arrested two men Oct. 10 for home invasion at a vacant house in the 27000 block of Hass.
A next-door neighbor called police about 4 p.m. and reported that two men in a 1996 Jeep Cherokee had pulled into the driveway, shouldered open a locked door and gone inside the house. When officers arrived they walked to the back of the house and met one of the suspects, a 17-year-old resident, and asked him if it was his house. When he answered “no,” he was arrested.
Inside the house police met the other suspect, a 31-year-old Detroit man, who also was arrested after admitting the house wasn’t his. Police had the vehicle towed to the older man’s girlfriend’s house in Detroit, because it was her vehicle.
The neighbor told police the owner of the house hadn’t lived there in more than five months, but had left some belongings inside.
Melvindale
Neighbor in the dog house
A 43-year-old resident in the 18000 block of Henry was issued a ticket for having a barking dog about 5:45 p.m. Monday after his neighbor called police to report the German shepherd.
Four prior complaints involving animals had been filed against the man. The ticket was issued when he wasn’t home.
When he returned about 7 p.m., he went to his neighbors’ front lawn and began yelling profanities and threats at them that were audible over the phone when they called police for assistance.
Officers advised the man to stay away from his neighbors’ house, and to take the ticket to court if he had issues with it.
Drunken man found with pot
A brown pickup truck was pulled over about 9 p.m. last Sunday in the 17200 block of Raupp after an officer noticed it had turned south without signaling and lacked a license plate light.
The 50-year-old Detroit driver smelled of intoxicants and said he had just left his girlfriend’s apartment. His hands were shaking as he looked for his identification.
After failing field sobriety tests, the man recorded a 0.147 percent blood-alcohol content level during a preliminary breath test. A level of 0.08 is considered intoxicated under Michigan law.
He was arrested and a knife was confiscated. A marijuana joint in a plastic bag was found in the truck’s driver’s-side door; the man admitted it was his.
At the station, additional marijuana was found wrapped in aluminum foil in the man’s left back pocket. A chemical breath test yielded a pair of 0.15 percent BAC levels; he also tested positive for marijuana use.
Lincoln Park
Convenience store robber sought
Police are looking for a man who robbed 7-Eleven, 1365 Dix, early Tuesday.
A clerk told them a light-skinned black man with a piece of clothing around his head that covered his face below his eyes entered the store about 1:20 a.m., walked up to the counter with a black revolver-style handgun and pointed it at him.
The man demanded all of the money in the cash register and told the clerk to put it in a bag. The clerk placed the money in a plastic grocery bag and handed it to the robber, who then left on foot going north. The clerk said the man held the gun in his right hand and kept it pointed at him the entire time.
Witnesses said the robber got into a black pickup truck driven by someone else. The truck then drove north on Dix.
Police are checking surveillance video. The robber is further described as about 22 years old and 5 feet 4 inches tall weighing about 130 pounds. He was wearing dark clothing and has short, black hair.
Tobacco thieves strike early
Police were called about 4 a.m. Wednesday to the Sunoco gas station, 3216 Dix, on word of a burglary.
They found the front door smashed in and some loose tobacco, cigars and miscellaneous tobacco products missing from a shelf near the entrance.
A loose bag of pipe tobacco and a box of cigars were lying in the street near Richmond.
Security cameras showed a male of unknown race about 5 feet 9 inches tall entering the business by apparently using a crowbar to break the glass and then reaching in to unlock the door. He is seen removing numerous tobacco products from a shelf before leaving and was inside the business for about three minutes.
The robber had facial hair and was wearing a blue shirt and dark-colored pants.
Southgate
Restaurant cash drawer emptied
About $150 cash was taken early Oct. 10 during a break in at Black Pine Tree Sushi Bar, 16052 Eureka Road.
The front glass door had been shattered by a landscaping brick about 3:40 a.m., setting off an alarm.
A cash register was tipped over, and the drawer containing the cash was removed.
Snowblower swiped
A snowblower was taken sometime before 9 a.m. from a garage in the 15600 block of Scott.
It was value at about $800.
Trenton
Car parts store finally spots bad checks
A loss prevention employee met police Oct. 8 at Advance Auto Parts, 3695 West, to report that a regular customer from Riverview had been passing a series of bad checks at the store.
He had started using the checks in May to pay for goods and continued until Sept. 1. He wrote 59 checks for a total of $9,664.11. The first nine were returned for insufficient funds. The next six were returned to the maker. The next 40 were written on an account that apparently was closed sometime after June 9.
The loss prevention official said corporate policy caused the lag time in determining the crime.
The man is believed to be running an auto repair facility out of his house in the 14100 block of Huntington in Riverview. The store manager said she could identify him.
Copies of all of the checks were given to police as evidence.
Girl ordered off father’s moped
An off-duty officer was in the 100 block of Cleveland about 4:15 p.m. Oct. 12 when residents notified him that man was giving his daughter a ride on a moped, which is illegal in Michigan.
Police had had previous contact with the man about moped rides. The officer did not see him at first, but soon heard a moped start up and begin driving around the neighborhood.
When the sound indicated the moped was returning to the officer’s location, he stepped into the street to see the man riding with his 7-year-old daughter. She was not wearing a helmet, nor was she wearing any shoes or anything covering her legs to protect her from exposure to the hot tailpipe.
The man saw the officer and tried to drive away, but the officer waved him down in the street. The daughter began crying and climbed off the moped, nearly touching the tailpipe with her bare foot and bare leg.
The man said he was giving her a ride because she had been crying since she got home from school that afternoon. The officer explained that state law allows only the driver to ride on a moped, and that the girl’s lack of protection put her at risk of harm.
Police did not cite the man, but warned him against giving his daughter future rides, saying they would be following up on the situation.
Taylor
Visiting power washer stolen
A power washer was discovered missing about 1 p.m. Oct. 5 from a garage in the 5800 block of Roosevelt.
It belonged to the resident’s granddaughter, who is in the process of moving.
A neighbor to the south said he saw a motion-detector light activate about 4 a.m. The garage’s side door had been forced open.
House relieved of jewelry, laptop
Jewelry and a laptop computer were taken between 6 and 9:30 p.m. Oct. 7 from a house in the 26800 block of California.
A jewelry box in a bedroom had been rummaged through, and rings, necklaces and earrings with a total value of about $2,000 were missing.
The laptop computer, which had been atop a kitchen counter, was valued at $2,100.
Police believe entry was gained through a door that had been left open.
Crash and dash dings gas pump
A gas pump was damaged early last Sunday at the Valero gas station, 22422 Wick Road.
A clerk said a man came in just after 2 a.m. to buy cigarettes, exited the store and got into a maroon Buick four-door sedan driven by a white woman, who then backed the car into the pump and sped off.
The clerk did not get a license plate number. The pump’s casing and nozzle assembly were damaged.
Riverview
Man said city told him to dump illegally
Officers responded to an illegally parked trailer and sod debris in the roadway multiple times between Oct. 6 and 10 in the 17900 block of Mulberry. An officer was sent Oct. 6 and told the resident that the trailer and sod debris, which were in place since Oct. 4, needed to be moved.
The neighbor who originally complained called again Oct. 9, but no one was home when an officer came by. The resident told an officer last Sunday that he was a Department of Public Works clerk advised him leave the sod debris there and call Wednesday for a special pickup Thursday.
The officer went to get the resident a hard copy of the law prohibiting such placement of sod debris and returned four hours later to find that the resident and the trailer were gone.
The officer then issued a ticket for illegal dumping.
Driver never had license
A 20-year-old River Rouge man driving a black 2004 Hyundai XG350 was arrested about 12:45 a.m. last Sunday after illegally turning through a red light from eastbound Pennsylvania to southbound Fort Street.
An officer sitting in the parking lot at the southwest corner of the intersection saw the vehicle stop at the light before turning despite a sign prohibiting a right turn on red.
When stopped the man presented a mutilated Michigan identification card and said he thought his license was suspended. A check of the system showed the man had never acquired a license, and that he had three open traffic suspensions and three fugitive warrants stemming from three instances, one in 2005 and two in 2008.
During the arrest a vinyl purse was taken into safekeeping because the contents did not belong to the man or the vehicle’s registered owner. The man said it belonged to his girlfriend. He used his one telephone call at the police station to tell her to pick it up.
Wyandotte
Football fan attacked at bar after game
Following a dispute over the Oct. 9 football game between Michigan State University and the University of Michigan, three men assaulted a 42-year-old resident about 2 a.m. last Sunday at the Chas Bar, 500 Ford Ave.
The resident was talking to the three men, described as white and between the ages of 35 and 40, when one man pushed the resident to the ground and kicked him in the face repeatedly. Another bar patron broke up the fight, and the three men then fled. A bar employee witnessed the attack.
When police arrived, the resident was highly intoxicated and unaware he had been assaulted. He was unable to provide his own contact information or address. A severe laceration above his right eye required numerous stitches.
At the bar, the man said he had no idea who assaulted him. At the hospital, however, he said his attackers would “get what they have coming to them.”
Drunken man stumbles through park
A 51-year-old Flat Rock man was arrested about 3:15 p.m. Oct. 6 after following women and children around Bishop Park.
A woman called police after leaving the park. When they arrived, several other park users pointed out the man.
Officers watched as he nearly fell several times while trying to walk away from them. He then walked into the street in front of a vehicle traveling north. Police stopped him and another man at Van Alstyne and Superior to ask what they were doing in the park.
The Flat Rock man had trouble maintaining balance while standing still and was arrested for being a disorderly person. In a preliminary breath test at the police station he showed a 0.199 percent blood-alcohol content; 0.08 percent is considered intoxicated under state law.
(Compiled by Chris Jackett, J. Patrick Pepper and Tom Tigani.)