NEW YORK (1010 WINS/WCBS 880) – The NYPD released new images Friday of multiple suspects they're searching for in two robbery sprees involving mopeds, days after officials revealed there's been an extraordinary increase in such robberies across the city, as well as an historic number of seizures of the often illegal two-wheeled vehicles.
At a press conference on this week's shooting of two NYPD officers, NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said mopeds and scooters are being used for crimes at an alarming rate citywide.
"Scooters and bikes are being used citywide to commit crimes; these crimes include shooting, robberies and phone-snatches," Kenny said. "Many of these crimes have all been committed by the perpetrators riding on scooters and motorbikes."
According to the chief, there were zero robbery patterns involving motorbikes from Jan. 1 to June 1, 2022. During that same period in 2023, there were 20 such robbery patterns being investigated.
However, in the first five months of 2024, police are investigating more than 80 such robbery patterns "encompassing hundreds and hundreds of incidents," Kenny said.
That's a more than 300% increase from 2023, and an over 8,000% increase from 2022. The rise parallels the rapid proliferation of the vehicles in the boroughs during the pandemic, when they were adopted by many delivery drivers to meet a growing demand for app-based services. Now they're increasingly being embraced by robbers hoping for a quick getaway.
Kenny pointed to the figures because the 19-year-old man suspected of shooting the two cops in East Elmhurst early Monday is also suspected of belonging to a crew that's behind several robbery patterns involving mopeds in Queens. Indeed, the suspect, Bernardo Raul Castro Mata, actually caught the attention of the officers because he was illegally operating an unregistered moped the wrong way down a street, not far from the migrant shelter near LaGuardia Airport where he was a resident, officials said. He was charged Wednesday with attempted murder and other crimes.
On Wednesday, the NYPD release its May crime stats, and while overall major crimes like murder and burglary were down 2.4%, robbery and felony assault increased in May, a rise " largely fueled by offenders fleeing crime scenes on illegal, unregistered motorized scooters, bikes, or other vehicles."
The NYPD recently began a summer enforcement strategy aimed at removing illegal mopeds, scooters, ATVs and other bikes from streets "following an increase in shootings, robberies, and grand larcenies involving such vehicles," the department said in a summary of the May crime data.
In 2023, the NYPD confiscated 18,430 illegal and unregistered motorized scooters and bikes—the highest number in city history and a 128% increase from 2022. So far in 2024, 13,000 illegal two-wheeled vehicles and ATVs have been seized, for a total of 42,000 since the start of 2022, a record amount.
The large increase in moped-involved crimes and seizures is a stunning, but not entirely surprising, rise if you look at crime reports being put out by the NYPD. On Friday alone, the department released new photos to the media of two robbery patterns involving mopeds.
In one pattern out of Brooklyn, two thieves on a moped robbed two women over 30 minutes in Williamsburg and Bedford-Stuyvesant, police said.
The first victim was a 24-year-old woman standing at Broadway and Wythe Avenue around 3:05 p.m. The robbers snatched a chain from her neck and fled on a moped down Myrtle Avenue.
Minutes later, a 29-year-old woman was standing at Walworth Street and Park Avenue at 3:30 p.m. when the same suspects allegedly grabbed a chain from her neck. They fled eastbound on Park Avenue.
The first victim was not physically injured, police said, while the second victim suffered pain and redness to her neck.
In the second robbery pattern, another pair of suspects has been linked to four robberies in Manhattan and Brooklyn.
In the most recent robbery, a 24-year-old man was walking at Chrystie Street and Stanton Street on the Lower East Side just before 3 p.m. on May 16, when the duo grabbed the headphones off his head and fled.
Investigators believe the same two suspects struck three times in Brooklyn on the evening of May 13 over the span of a half-hour.
The crime spree started around 5:50 p.m., when a 24-year-old man was attacked at Marcy Avenue and Metropolitan Avenue in Williamsburg. He was punched, kicked and robbed of his headphones. EMS treated him at the scene.
Five minutes later, a 30-year-old woman had the headphones ripped off her head at Java Street and Manhattan Avenue in Greenpoint. Then at 6:20 p.m., a 27-year-old woman had the same thing happen to her a few blocks away at Huron Street and McGuinness Boulevard. Those two victims weren't physically injured, police said.
At a press conference in April from Central Park, NYPD Assistant Chief Jason Savino, of the Detectives Bureau, said mopeds and scooters have emboldened robbers to commit more crimes.
"What we're seeing is robbery sprees," Savino said. "With the accessibility of all the scooters right now, we're seeing them kind of empowered by that and then doing additional robberies."
Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS.