STATEN ISLAND, NY – So, is it the perception of crime or actual crime?
Owners of Staten Island restaurants and other businesses know the difference. They know that the crime is real because their establishments have been targeted non-stop in the past months.
The latest damage was discovered on Tuesday. The glass doors of three shops in West Brighton were smashed in the early hours of the morning.
Among the establishments hit was the Nurnberger Bierhaus on Castleton Avenue. A cash register was taken and later found blocks away.
Nurnberger has one week before closing its doors for good after nearly two decades of operation. The robbery is a sad farewell for this prime neighborhood.
Killah Coffee on Castleton Avenue and Northside Coffee on Forest Avenue were also broken into that morning. No recovery was seen from the last two locations although both properties were damaged.
There have been a string of 23 break-ins at Staten Island businesses in the past few months, including restaurants, delis and bagel shops. Many of the establishments that were hit were in the Forest Avenue area but damage was also seen in other areas of the North Shore.
A restaurant owner in the area said they were considering getting a gun for protection. That is the real fear of real crime. It’s not just a perception that things are bad, as Mayor Eric Adams and others have said. Things are really bad there.
During an attempted robbery at Bagels Bread & Butter on Forest Avenue, one of the two accused robbers brandished a machete and threw it at an NYPD lieutenant who responded to the scene.
District Attorney Michael E. McMahon requested $300,000 bail for each defendant in the case. But Judge Raja Rajeswari denied the request and set supervised release.
Thank you very much, bail-reform advocates.
If someone who uses a machete while committing a crime and then throws the machete at a police officer doesn’t deserve to be locked up, who does? McMahon was right when he said the case “will show how broken our system is.”
Criminal offenders know that they have no fear of the justice system even if they are caught committing a crime. Democratic lawmakers in New York State prefer to signal and side with criminals rather than victims of crime, including small business owners.
Some business owners blame neighborhood drug users for some of the crime.
We can also lay that at the feet of the New York Democrats, who not only turned a blind eye to hard street drug use, but actually encouraged it by building legal drug-injection sites.
Criminals get a clear message: Do what you want. You are not responsible. We’ve all seen the consequences of that writ large, including here in New York City’s safest borough.
The last two years have been tough for business owners on Staten Island, especially in the restaurant business.
They are struggling to get their businesses and profits back to levels seen before the COVID-19 pandemic. They face ever-increasing prices due to inflation. They suffer from severe staff shortages.
Now they have to fear random break-ins and violence.
It wasn’t always this way, of course. There was a time when New York City kept crime at historic lows, a time when even those who committed minor crimes suffered at least some consequences.
It seems so long ago.
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