108th Pct. Cops Of the Month Confront Stabber
BY THOMAS COGAN

"Unfortunately, this month wasn't as good as last month," Deputy Inspector Thomas Kavanagh, commanding officer of the 108th Police Precinct, said as he prepared to read the crime report at the April meeting of the precinct community council. The Cop of the Month award ceremony, which immediately preceded his report, bore him out.

The Cops of the Month awards went to three regular officers and one auxiliary officer, all of whom assisted at an incident in Woodside in which a woman was stabbed and her young daughter severely injured. On Sunday evening, April 6, the precinct got a call about a loud, possibly violent domestic incident occurring at 35-54 64th St., a two-story house on the corner of 37th Avenue. Responding officers discovered a woman and a young girl critically injured with multiple stab wounds. Both were rushed to a local hospital, where the woman later died. The girl, who was identified as the woman's daughter, underwent emergency treatment and lived. A man wielding a knife in the apartment had to be talked into surrendering, but only after Auxiliary Officer Bilal Palbalkar was called in to translate, since the man, husband and father to the dead woman and the girl, could speak only Punjabi. For their handling of this hazardous situation, Officers Paul Chambers, Christopher Mason and Maureen Stefenelli joined Palbalkar as recipients of Cop of the Month award plaques.

Homicide might retard the most progressive of reports, but the crime report for April delivered by Kavanaugh disclosed that index crimes, those considered most severe, were up 35 percent. There were increases in burglaries, assaults and car thefts. "Any good news?" Kavanagh asked as he opened the meeting to questions. "I'm ready for it."

The rising crime rate included three rapes. Though he did not offer the circumstances as mitigating, Lieutenant Mark Wachter pointed out that each rape case involved persons familiar with each other, meaning there were no instances of a rapist or rapists on the prowl in the neighborhood. Burglaries occurred at several restaurants, including Turkish Grill on Queens Boulevard near 42nd Street and The Kettle on Skillman Avenue at 51st Street.

A woman from 44th Avenue in Woodside began the question period with a complaint about having to live next to a construction site that was abandoned by its bankrupt builders in 2006 and which, she said, is now used as a convenient hangout space by vagrants and day laborers, who use her front porch, located to the left of the construction site, as a road to get there. Wachter said the precinct is familiar with the site and its problems, though Community Affairs Officer Maro Youssef took further information from the woman. Joe Rusalski followed with the complaint of many, saying that livery cabs park at metered spaces and don't bother to pay, at the same time blocking those motorists who would park in those spaces and pay. Wachter promised that next day would see a lot of ticketed livery cabs. Several bar/restaurants changed hands or put on new faces, though bothersome noise levels remained the same, according to nearby neighbors. Bar 43, 43-08 43rd St. is the latest attempt to sustain a bar at that address, where several names and themes have come and gone in the past few years. It has not yet officially opened, but a man told the meeting about a recent preopening party that included a hired bus full of celebrants, who took to drinking on the bus, in the unfinished bar and on the street. The man said that appeals to the owner were scoffed at. The place at 41-46 54th St. was once Angie's, then Angelo's and is now Tamal, a Mexican bar and grill (though currently a sign by the door announces that the kitchen is not yet open). A woman complained that the noise is unbearable.

Another woman had some questions about the policy for towing cars. Hers had been towed on a street near Jackson Heights. She initially believed the vehicle had been stolen, though she realized towing was a possibility. When she talked to a private towing company about it, she was told the police maintain lists of towed cars, a revelation to her. Kavanagh found this hard to understand, and said the 108th always informs those who have been towed of the situation. Mention of private towing companies moved him to call them a problem in Queens and other boroughs except Manhattan, where "it's the DOT and the marshals" and there's no private towing.

Having welcomed Wachter to the precinct last month, the commander this month welcomed Captain Brendan Deary. He said teasingly of the two that they had brought all the problems of their old precincts with them.