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EAST HAMPTON VILLAGE — A Springs man, Darnell J. Walker, 39, was arrested by East Hampton Town Police at East Hampton Village Police headquarters in the early morning on April 13 on a felony charge of criminal weapon possession in the third degree. Walker had come to the Village Police headquarters a little before midnight on April 12, apparently to register a complaint about an incident that had occurred in Springs previously. It appears that, since Springs is in Town Police jurisdiction, Village Police reached out and a town officer was sent to take the report. Although the criminal complaint is not entirely clear as to how it occurred, at some point, Walker was discovered to be in possession of brass knuckles, which is considered a dangerous weapon. It appears from the statements Walker is quoted as making, that he may actually have been trying to turn the weapon in to police. Because Walker has a prior felony conviction from when he was 20 years old, what would’ve been a misdemeanor weapons possession charge was elevated to the felony level.
EAST HAMPTON AND MONTAUK — A simple second-degree harassment charge, which is only a violation, not a crime, led, it appears from the complaint, to a second incident at East Hampton Town Police headquarters in Wainscott on Friday afternoon. Justin Michael Jones, who was being processed after being charged with harassment for, according to the report, knocking another man off a bicycle in Montauk on West Lake Drive, was in police custody at headquarters about two hours after his arrest Friday when, the report reads, “while seated and handcuffed in the processing room of East Hampton Town Police headquarters, did kick a plastic black chair multiple times, causing the chair to crack on the back panel.” This led to a charge of criminal mischief. The charge was a misdemeanor in this case because the value of the chair did not meet the threshold of $250 that would have raised the charge to the felony level. During Jones’s virtual arraignment on Saturday morning, East Hampton Town Justice Steven Tekulsky told Jones that it appeared that there was an arrest warrant issued out of county court in Riverside against him for a violation of probation. According to court records online, Jones had pleaded guilty in June of last year to a felony charge of DWI following an arrest by the East Hampton Town Police in 2023. Jones has several prior felony convictions, Tekulsky noted. Because of the violation of probation arrest warrant, Jones was picked up by the Suffolk County Police after he was arraigned Saturday by sheriff’s officers and taken to County Jail in Yaphank.
EAST HAMPTON VILLAGE — A landscaper working on Easter morning on a newly developed property on the south side of Montauk Highway was written up for violating the village’s code forbidding the use of gas-powered equipment on holidays and Sundays.
EAST HAMPTON VILLAGE — A Huntting Lane resident reported to police last Thursday that she had been defrauded. She told police that on the previous day she received an online alert that her bank account had been compromised, with a link to click on. The woman clicked the link, which then provided a phone number that she was directed to call. The woman called and was instructed by someone posing as an employee from her bank that her account had been hacked into and that she needed to buy three Google gift cards. The woman purchased the Google gift cards as instructed and later read the numbers to the person she had spoken to earlier on the phone. That person told the woman that one of the cards was invalid and told her she should go back to the seller of the cards to purchase another one. Employees of that business then warned her that she was being scammed. At that point she contacted police, who are investigating.
MONTAUK — Kalani M. Panasch Heineman, 28, was charged with criminal mischief in the third-degree, a felony, the night of April 13 by East Hampton Town Police. Police said that in the parking area outside a residence on West Lake Drive, Panasch Heineman smashed the rear window of a 2008 Honda Accord using a nylon tow strap with a large metal hook to cause the damage. The charge is a felony because the value of the damaged item is over $250. He was scheduled to be arranged in East Hampton Town Justice Court yesterday.
