Miyakawa's site

People speculated – somewhat facetiously – that Friday’s bomb scare on Bedford Avenue must have been an art project because, after all, it is Williamsburg. Turns out they were right. 50-year-old artist and Brooklyn resident Takeshi Miyakawa was behind the installation and has since been arrested.

Police apprehended Miyakawa on Saturday when he was putting up another installation at the intersection of Bedford, Lorimer, and Nassau and charged him with planting false bombs. He was arraigned on Sunday and will be put through a 30 day mental health evaluation.

The objects – “I Love New York” bags that contain LED lights and battery packs – were for NY Design Week and supposedly would have come down today. An artist who works with Miyakawa described him as “polite, calm, and presentable.” The New York Times states that the artist intended the installation to be “a display of his love for the city.”

According to his website, Miyakawa was born in Japan and has been living in New York City since 1989. He mostly designs furniture, some of which is priced at $20,000.

via NY Daily News

Gothamist reports that police have charged Ryan Beauchamp with attempted assault (a misdemeanor) and harassment (a violation), not murder, for his involvement in last Friday’s deadly Bedford L station brawl. A misdemeanor carries a maximum of 1 year of jail time, while a violation is up to 15 days. Beauchamp has priors, including an Occupy Wall Street arrest in October and an earlier arrest in Connecticut.

This is the latest development after police first released a sketch, then a video, and then took Beauchamp in for questioning on Tuesday. As of yesterday afternoon one of the “WANTED” fliers still hung in the 1st Avenue L station.

With these charges come new details about the incident and Beauchamp’s background. While initial reports made it seem that both men were to blame and later accounts said Beauchamp was at fault, new witness accounts say Basin initiated the fight after Beauchamp bumped into him. One witness says “there was a point when it was over and Basin followed him.”

Beauchamp is 33-years-old, homeless, and originally from Westchester.

Basin’s funeral is this morning in Howard Beach.

via Gothamist

After first releasing a sketch and then surveillance video, police have now identified the suspect in Friday night’s Bedford Ave. L train murder as Ryan Beauchamp. According to reports, Beauchamp is 33-years-old and homeless and had tried to start altercations with several passengers on the train that night.

Update 7:19 PM: The Daily News and The New York Post report that police arrested Beauchamp in Bushwick this afternoon.

Gothamist

As you may have read by now, on Friday night an L train struck and killed a 20-year-old man who had fallen on to the subway tracks during a fight. We’ve posted about subway deaths before, but this one hits close to home as it happened at the Bedford L station.

According to accounts, two men were arguing on the train when things became physical. The altercation eventually moved out to the platform and both men fell on to the tracks. When the Manhattan-bound train approached, one man got out and fled, while the other was hit.

Initial reports seemed to put both men at fault, while later reports claimed the victim, a local college student named Joshua Basin, had been attacked by a drunk man.

Police have released a sketch of the suspect. Here is the description from Gothamist: “The suspect is described as a white male, between 30 and 35 years old, with a thin build, light complexion, dirty blond hair with pock marks on the right side of his face. He was wearing brown pants, black rain jacket and black sneakers.”

Call the Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS or visit NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM with any information.

via twitter

A truck’s overturned load shut down westbound traffic on the Williamsburg Bridge at around 5:50 this morning, according to reports. The truck happened to be carrying broccoli. Don’t worry, the driver wasn’t hurt. Clearing the truck took twenty minutes.

twitter

The big news from Bushwick this morning is that 29-year-old police officer Kevin Brennan will live after getting shot in the skull last night. Brennan is currently at Bellevue Hospital in critical but stable condition. The officer had responded to a call at the Bushwick Houses, a housing project bordered by Moore Street, Humboldt Street, Bushwick Avenue, and Flushing Avenue.

The shooter fled the scene at around 9 p.m., prompting a full fledged manhunt through the area that necessitated hundreds of police officers, dogs, and helicopters.

Twitter users knew something was wrong. “yeah I heard sirens all night, i guess there were hundreds of cops looking for the dude,” tweeted @hamm3r_time. “DO NOT GO OUTSIDE. There is a massive manhunt,” wrote @GunGirlNewYork. “Hostage negotiation team just rolled up, SWAT surrounding the building #bushwick” posted @uncleguito.

Police eventually caught and arrested 21-year-old Luis Ortiz, who was also wanted for a January 1st murder.

The Bushwick Houses was constructed in 1960 and consists of eight buildings that house 2,962 residents.

More amateur photos of the scene here.

Event Poster, via Buzzfeed

Details are just now emerging about Saturday night’s Occupy Williamsburg “Occu-Party.” According to NY Daily News, fifty protesters set up camp at The Bedford, a vacant residential building on N. 8th and Driggs, where they threw garbage cans and spray painted anti-police slogans. When police arrived at 11 p.m., one protester pepper-sprayed an officer, while others threw bottles that injured five other officers. Police arrested four protesters and charged them with obstructing government administration, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, and inciting a riot.

Village Voice staff writer Nick Pinto was on the scene that night and tweeted continuously about the action as it unfolded. Here’s Pinto’s perspective of how things went down, in chronological order:

At 207 N 8th in Williamsburg, an “Occuparty” — squatting in a half-finished luxury apartment — is getting underway. #OWS

Maybe 50 people in the ground-floor apartment. Whole building seems vacant, 75% renovated. Many hope this lasts past tonight.

Police are here, with flashlights. “Guys drop all the beers, that’s it.” not clear they get the scope of the invasion.

Glass on the front door just got smashed. Cop has his nightstick out. “I swear to god, get out of here!”

First arrest, a young woman. Bottle thrown. Cops badly outnumbered. This is getting crazy fast.

Police calling in backup as they push the crowd down 8th. Two cruisers here now.

Image c/o Gothamist

According to Gothamist, FDNY was ordered to forcibly enter 475 Kent owner Nachman Brach’s office at around 7am this morning, bringing in a sledgehammer and other serious equipment. A resident reportedly said that Brach was “hiding in the loading dock” and refusing to open the office; another told Gothamist that he saw officials from the tax department at the scene. While official information is yet to be released by authorities, the Village Voice reports that the Department of Buildings was also present, inspecting apartments, checking plumbing, outlets, etc. Luckily, officials claim that “no one was under any threat of eviction” but that Brach had not dealt with prior violations. Uh-oh. As you may recall, 150 residents, many artists and other creatives, were unceremoniously evacuated in winter of 2008; and a subsequent report revealed that 475 Kent was in violation of over 25 fire and building codes.

The waterfront wasn’t the only one getting a sweet summer raid.

Image c/o New York Daily News/Robert Mecea/AP

Brooklyn Paper reports that the McKibbin lofts across town experienced a more high-profile bust yesterday when the FBI came in search of an “elusive global hacker collective that has allegedly coordinated large-scale attacks on corporate and government websites, including PayPal, MasterCard and Visa.” After officials discovered that the suspected tenants had already moved on from the “transient” residency, it was determined they no longer had probable cause to continue the search. However, they did seem to enjoy their visit. According to resident Meaghan Ralph:

They cracked jokes about how the whole building smelled like weed and that they were going to get a contact high. They said we had a really cool apartment and that they would want to live there if they were 22 or 23.

image c/o City Room

Now that the weather is a sexy summer boil, it’s time to hop on those pretty little bikes for some outdoor adventuring. However, NYPD is notoriously and disproportionately cracking down on cyclists. And their main objective: quantity over quality.

Streetsblog procured the police cheatsheet[.pdf] instructing law enforcement as to “illegal” biking conduct. Unfortunately, the list is not entirely legally accurate. In combo with some guidelines taken from Transportation Alternatives, the following is a brief guide on how to avoid (and fight) the impending doom that is NYPD’s current cycle wrath:

The police can ticket you for…

* Failure to yield to pedestrians at an intersection with signal
* Failure to signal turn
* Failure to stop for red light
* Riding the wrong way on a one-way street
* Riding on a sidewalk
* Riding in any park except in places designated for bike riding
* Improper riding of bicycle
* Too many riders on a bicycle
* Clinging to a vehicle
* Attaching self to vehicle
* No or inadequate lights
* No bell or signal device
* No or inadequate brakes
* No or improper reflectorization
* Carrying articles on bicycles – [carry that tote bag like a normal person!]

In New York City, the police CANNOT ticket you for…

(more…)

Jesse S., who took this photo, tells me officers were handing out pamphlets on bike safety and “ticketing everybody for everything.” My favorite part, as you can see above in Exhibit A, is the helpful construction sign asking, “What’s going on here?” on behalf of us humans. Somebody, answer this bridge’s sign.