Halloween is usually the holiday when vandals strike, but this year it was Thanksgiving.
Early in the morning on Thursday, November 25, someone wondered around Sackett and Hone streets, smashing out the windows of parked cars.
Officials with the 49thPrecinct said the vandals hit about 13 parked vehicles. So far there are no suspects in the crime.
“Unfortunately, nobody witnessed anything,” said Victor DiPierro, the precinct’s community affairs officer. “It was an act of vandalism that nobody witnessed. We have no leads of who’s responsible, but the patrol will be stepped up in that area of the precinct.”
Al D’Angelo, president of the Morris Park Community Association, said the group has put up a $1,000 reward for anyone who can provide information leading to the arrest of the perpetrators.
“We’ve had enough of these dirt bags doing stuff like this,” he said, furious that such violent vandalism would happen in the area. “Hopefully it’s not neighborhood kids. It’s exactly things like this that’ll lead people to leave the neighborhood and move someplace else.”
Mike Alessandro, a Hone Avenue resident, guessed that the perps were probably people from the area, drunk and looking to make mischief. The back passenger window of his mother’s black sedan was smashed out. Alessandro said he left a valuable bag in the car that evening, but the vandals did not take it.
“I don’t think they were looking to steal anything,” he said. “It was just a random thing to do, just to cause trouble.”
“It’s horrible,” said his wife Jean, who has been living in the area for most of her life. “This is a nice neighborhood. There are hard-working people here and to come and do this, especially on a holiday, is terrible.”
The family spent Thanksgiving morning filing a police report.
The owner of a beige SUV, who declined to give her name, said a neighbor told her Thursday morning about the damage to her car. Her driver’s side passenger window had been smashed.
On Friday the glass was still evident on the street next to the car. She planned to get the window fixed later that day.
She was very surprised when she heard that her car had been broken into, but she remembered hearing car alarms blaring at about 1 a.m. Thursday morning, she said.
“When I looked out the window I didn’t see anything,” she said. “I was really upset, especially on Thanksgiving.”
The woman moved into the Sackett Avenue apartment only about five months ago, so she is pretty new to the area, she said.
“I guess I’ve got to keep my eyes open,” she said. “It’s a quiet neighborhood, but I guess a lot of things can happen, instead of the busy places where cars and people are always outside.”
