Residents raise park safety and theft concerns at 72nd Precinct meeting

At the Sept. 8 72nd Precinct Community Council meeting, officers were recognized for arrests in two cases while residents used the public-comment period to raise concerns about a theft on 52nd Street and police vehicles they said were speeding through the park.

Police recover four stolen mopeds

On July 10 near the corner of 16th Street and Prospect Park Southwest, four masked individuals “ambushed” an Uber delivery driver while he was on his moped, according to police at the 72nd Precinct. They pulled the driver from the moped and “violently assaulted him by punching and kicking him,” police said, before fleeing with the vehicle.

Police officers who responded were told by the driver that the moped had a tracking device. Sergeant Corlette, Officer Perez-Gomez and Officer Tinoco “immediately utilized the tracking data,” which led police to Shore Road in Bay Ridge, where they “successfully cornered the group inside the public park,” according to police documents.

Police said all four suspects were arrested without incident. The victim’s moped was recovered along with three other stolen mopeds.

Commanding Officer Deputy Inspector Mobeen Yasin awarded Sergeant Corlette, Officer Perez-Gomez and Officer Tinoco the July Cop of the Month Award.

Police arrest man with loaded handgun

On the night of Aug. 2, while on routine patrol near the corner of 44th Street and Seventh Avenue, Officers Brandon Morales and Abed Hamdan “observed a suspicious group gathered,” according to police documents. They then saw one man hand a fanny pack to another.

The officers got out of their vehicle to investigate and apprehended the man who had received the fanny pack, police said. Inside, they found a loaded .40-caliber Glock 23 semiautomatic pistol containing 13 rounds.

As the officers arrested the suspect holding the fanny pack, police said the man who had originally possessed it fled on foot. The officers recognized him from a past investigation. Ten days later, Morales and Hamdan tracked down the second suspect and arrested him. Police said both suspects were charged with criminal possession of a weapon.

Yasin thanked the two officers for “taking a loaded illegal firearm and two dangerous individuals off our streets.” He congratulated Morales and Hamdan as the 72nd Precinct’s Cops of the Month for August 2026.

52nd Street theft of metal posts

During public comment, Raquel Miranda raised concerns about iron “posts” she said were stolen from her front yard on 52nd Street. Miranda said thieves took the original iron posts at about 4:45 a.m. on Aug. 24 and that replacing them would cost between $2,000 and $5,000. She said neighbors who may have surveillance video of the incident did not share the images.

Reports of police vehicles speeding through the park

Katie Mohrhauser, a parent of a toddler, said she witnessed two incidents involving police vehicles “speeding through the park from the entrance at 7th and 41st to pick up officers who were finishing their shifts at the pool.”

She said children had to scatter because of the “dangerous speed.” During public comment, she said it was unnecessary for officers to be picked up inside the park.

“There is no reason for them to be driving through the park when the officers can walk the few hundred feet to be picked up at the street,” Mohrhauser said.

Yasin said he wished the issue had been brought to him earlier in the summer, agreed that it was dangerous and promised to look into the allegations and take immediate action.