Phone Scam
Duped
A man called a couple in Amagansett and told them over the telephone that he was their grandson and that he was in Europe in a bad motorcycle accident. He then told them he needed $4,700 to which the couple immediately sent via Western Union. The couple then found out that the man was not who he said he was. [expand]
Good Cabby
A cab driver flagged down a police officer in East Hampton for help when he noticed that the passengers in his car were asleep and would not wake up. When the officer looked into the back of the cab, he saw the two sleeping passengers. One of them had a white, powdery substance around his nostrils. The officer was able to wake him up, and found him to be in possession of cocaine. The officer arrested the man, and put him inside of his police car with handcuffs and went back to the cab to check on the other man. At which point the kid that was just arrested pushed open the door of the police car and fled into the woods. After a quick manhunt, he was found 100 yards away near a deer fence. All we can say here is that this would have made a good episode of “Cops: Hamptons.”
Shelter Island
Old Man McGumbus, 99 years-old, quietly racist, President of the Shelter Island Assault Rifles Club, founder of Rocket Launchers and Bullets Magazine and former World War II mine planter, was in his garden planting tulips and checking on his tomatoes when he uncovered a suspicious chest buried in his garden. McGumbus opened the chest and found inside a complex looking device with the words “Time Machine” written on it. Believing he had found a time machine, the old man placed the device on top of his head and turned it on and was immediately electrocuted. A neighbor saw McGumbus pass out and called the authorities. When he awoke, McGumbus immediately thought that he had traveled into a new time and was heard responding, “WHAT YEAR IS IT? WHAT YEAR IS IT?” When nobody answered him immediately, he punched the ambulance worker in the face and then began running down the street. He was found hiding inside of his underground bunker behind his house. When everything was explained, no charges were filed for assault against the ambulance worker.
Gate Crasher
A man drove his car directly into the Hedges Inn in East Hampton last week. The Inn is located across from the intersection of Woods Lane and Ocean Avenue and for some reason drivers going down Montauk Highway occasionally do not notice the left turn and continue to drive straight, just past Town Pond and then into the Inn. This seems to happen every summer and is pretty odd. My solution? Extend Town Pond farther out so that if a car does this they go for a swim instead.
–David Lion Rattiner