| Most Wanted Criminals Although crime in Queens has continued to drop over recent years, the following suspects seem to be unaware of the trend. Here are the New York Police Department’s top ten criminals.1.
Giovanni Anzora 2. Thomas
Acosta 3. Man Singh 4. Michael
Francis 5. Ryan
Johnson 7. Fernando
Cuartas 8. Oscar
Ortiz 9. Eric
Coles 10. Moised
Interiano 1. 25 people died due to smoking carelessness. The FDNY encourages people to get out of bed for a cigarette and putting the butt out in an ashtray instead of your downstairs neighbor’s balcony. 2. 20
people died as a result of extension or appliance cord
malfunction. The FDNY reminds people to not overburden extension cords
and check electrical cords for wear. 4. 14 people died because of cooking carelessness, such as leaving the stove on or taking a shower while the kettle lost water and went on fire. 5. 10 people died in fatal fires that were caused by candles. 6. 6 people died because of fires caused by electrical or space heaters; another six fatalities were due to natural gas or other vapors going on fire.
Did you know, tucked
between the serenity of Queens’ tree-lined streets lay more than
a dozen graveyards? 1. March 20, 1927–Ruth Snyder tried nine times to kill her husband Albert. She poisoned him, fed him mercury tablets. But nothing worked until Snyder hooked-up with her girdle salesman lover to kill Albert for good. 2. Feb.
26, 1988–The other cops called him “Rookie.”
Police officer Edward Byrne was just four days past his 22nd birthday
when he sat alone guarding the home of a drug 3. July,
1965– Alice Crimmins went through boyfriends the way
most people go through toothpaste, detectives said. The redhead was
a knockout who could have been model or an actress. Prosecutors said
that there were just two things in her way, her children. 4. July, 1976 – August, 1977–David Berkowitz liked pretty, young women with long hair. He thought the woman of Queens were the best of all… to kill. Over the course of a year, Berkowitz killed six people, five of them women. He wounded seven others, striking eight times in three boroughs with his .44-caliber revolver. He said a 6,000-year old demon called Sam told him to him to kill. He called himself the “Son of Sam.” 5. Dec.
20, 1986– It was the night that shamed a neighborhood.
Michael Griffin, 24, was stranded in Howard Beach that night with two
friends when their car broke down on the Cross Bay Boulevard. The three
men made their way to New Park Pizza to use the phone. After being turned
down they were arrested by a dozen white men and beaten with bats and
fists. 6. Dec. 11, 1978–They were the “Goodfellas” of the cinema. They pulled off the $6 million Lufthansa Airlines heist at JFK Airport, then the biggest theft in U.S. history. But Henry Hill, a former mobster feared becoming the next victim of the cover-up, so he grew a beard and told all to the feds. Jimmy “The Gent” Burke, the heist mastermind, was never charged with the crime and the cash and jewels were never recovered. 7. 1985– To Thousands of Queens residents, John Gotti was a neighborhood hero who lit up the streets outside the Bergen Hunt and Fish Club each July 4, with a massive – and very illegal – fireworks display. But to the Feds, Gotti was a thug, a murderer and thief. Gotti was arrested in 1992 for the 1985 murder of Paul Castellano, a mob rival. He died in jail of cancer. 8. 1980– John Favara, who in 1980 accidentally ran over and killed a son of mobster John Gotti, was severely beaten by Victoria Gotti, the mob boss’ wife. A few months later witnesses saw two men put Favara in the back seat of a car. Favara was never heard from again, but police could not peg Gotti for the disappearance, he was vacationing in Florida with Victoria at the time. 9. March
18, 1992– Manuel de Dios , 49, was in the Meson Asutrias
Restaurant at 40-12 82nd St., seated at the end of the bar talking with
some friends when a young Hispanic man entered the restaurant, looked
at de Dios and headed to the street. Moments later, the man returned,
shooting de Dios in the head, killing him instantly. 10. March
13, 1964– Kitty Genovese was attacked outside her building
by a knife-wielding stranger set on murder in the early morning hours.
38 people peered through curtains to witness the brutal stalking and
murder of Genovese, 28. They listened to her screams and pleas for help
– and did nothing. The silence and inaction of Kitty’s neighbors
became one of the most graphic and shameful illustrations of alienation
in big-city life. Worst Fires
“Mayday! I’m near the steps – get me!” cried one of three Queens firefighters who died in what is described by FDNY officials as the “most horrible inferno.” The five-alarm fire at Long Island General Supply Co. in Astoria turned deadly when an explosion tore apart the buildings brick walls and roof on June 17, 2001, Father’s Day. The blaze was described, at the time, as one of the worst, and most tragic in the history of the FDNY. Fire officials released the following list of “some” of the borough’s worst fires. 1. JFK Terminal
– August, 1992 2. Forest Hills – Queens Boulevard – March, 1992 3. Long Island City – 36th Avenue – October, 1995 4. Steinway Street – September, 1997 5. Jamaica “Squatter” – Blaze – Dec. 31, 1996 6. Father’s Day Fire –June, 2001 7. Queens Boulevard – in Sunnyside – August, 2002 8. 21st Street in Astoria – September, 2004
1. 1989
Toyota Camry
Firefighters, smudged
and sweaty, emerge from blazes across the borough day-to-day, with scant
applause. It’s down-in-the-trenches firefighters who pull people
from wrecked cars, mangled trains, and smoke-ravaged buildings who often
are overlooked and forgotten by the press and the public.
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