News Of The Neighborhoods
COMPILED BY LIZ GOFF

NYPD Needs Help Tracking Rapist

High-ranking NYPD sources this week responded to an ultimatum by Queens politicians demanding the capture of a Southeast Queens rapist by calling on the community to finger the suspect.

Senator Malcom Smith last week said he would ask Governor David Paterson to send state troopers and the National Guard to Queens to nab the rapist, if police fail to do so by August 8.

Smith said at least 12 women have been raped, sodomized or sexually assaulted in Southeast Queens since last November and expressed his belief that NYPD officials have been slow on their response to the attacks because they occurred in the predominantly black community.

Fellow lawmakers and Reverend Floyd Flake, argued that police response would have been quite different if the attacks had taken place in Manhattan, rather than Southeast Queens, backed Smith's criticism.

Police officials said plainclothes cops have been working overtime at bus stops and other locations where the rapist struck in an effort to catch the suspect. Officers at local precincts have been assigned to standing patrols at bus stops in the area of the attacks and have been searching buses for the suspect.

City Councilmember Leroy Comrie argued that the patrols are not effective. Comrie has called on NYPD officials to establish a special Task Force in the area to catch the rapist before he can strike again. Police officials had no comment on the councilmember's request.

Police sources said the NYPD has responded by bringing additional resources to the streets, with covert operations designed to trap the rapist and by beefing up regular patrols in areas where the attacks occurred. "The community can help by cooperating with the investigation. The NYPD has blanketed the media, and the affected community, with photos and a video of the suspect. Surely, there is someone out there who can identify this guy. We need that person, or persons, to come forward and cooperate with police to effect the arrest of this suspect."

Flushing Blast Victims 'Holding Their Own'

A Queens pastor is asking New Yorkers to pray for the Flushing man and his 2-year-old daughter who were severely burned in an explosion last month at their Flushing apartment building.

Edgar Zaldumbide was burned over 75 percent of his body and his daughter, Melissa, was badly burned by a massive explosion at the building at 147- 25 Sanford Ave. Father and daughter are being treated at the New York Hospital- Weill Cornell Burn Unit, where Edgar remains in critical condition.

Pastor Raul Latoni of the First Baptist Church in Flushing last week asked that everyone pray for the two victims and all the families displaced by the blast. Nine other families are members of the congregation, Latoni said.

"We thank God that Edgar and Melissa are hanging in there," Latoni said. "We will do our best to help them, and all the other families displaced by this tragedy."

Fire marshals are still probing the cause of the blast, which was initially determined to be a gas explosion.