Watch Out For Post-Hurricane Thieves

Last night, we received an email from a worried FiPS reader who told us about a creepy man possibly trying to break into Park Slope apartment buildings on 2nd Street near 6th Avenue. Here's the account:

"We stopped someone who appeared to be trying to enter the Garden Apt in our building. It was at 3:20pm on Tuesday.  He wore jeans, a nice black coat, large baseball cap, and large glasses, which practically covered his face. Basically, he fit into normal foot traffic. He was African American, about 5'9,'' early to mid 30s, about medium build. My wife noticed an outlined, gold tooth between the canine and two front teeth.  

He walked his bike to the outside our house, approached the house with a package (which looked like an empty shipping package bag). He then rang that apt's doorbell, but no one came. He walked to the curb, checked to make sure that no one was looking, then quickly turned around slipped a work glove on and and pulled something out that looked like a key (After reviewing our camera footage many times, I see it's bigger then a key, more like a leather man tool). He approached the garden apartment door again and acted like he was going into his own apartment.

We watched him out of our parlor floor window for about 15 seconds.  When we got outside and asked him what he was doing, he pretended to be getting recycled bottles from our trash (from under our stoop).   It was a little creepy.  He keep one hand in his coat, and we kept asking him what he was doing. We told him that we caught him under our stoop and he laughed it off. He made a show of going into our recycling can, then quickly walked back to his bike and rode away.

I can't determine if anything was taken from the apartment below. Nothing seems to be missing, but it's possible that mail was taken out of our box, because the mail man had come about 20 minutes before this guy came.  I guess packages could have been taken from behind the gate.

I talked with neighbors walking by, and he was seen on adjacent streets, sometimes in peoples' front yards, acting creepy. 

We've urged this FiPS tipster to call the police and share the security camera footage that was captured. In the meantime, stay vigilant, ppl!