Public safety.................... 1, 4

Mystery keys show up in home; phantom turkeys don’t get driver off hook for tow

Excerpts from the Marblehead police log of Tuesday, Jan. 3 through Wednesday, Jan. 11, 2023. Consistent with state law, Marblehead Police have adopted a policy of not providing to media outlets reports related to incidents related to domestic violence, juveniles and matters that remain under investigation.

Tuesday, Jan. 3

12:03 a.m. Suspicious activity reported on Bennett Road. 2:13 p.m. A walk-in to the police station brought in a pearl necklace that had been found at Fort Sewall. 2:23 p.m. A caller reported a large puddle in the street on West Shore Drive at Jersey Street.

Wednesday, Jan. 4

8:04 a.m. A caller reported a car that was parked for a long period of time on Harbor Avenue. 10:51 a.m. Investigated report that Light Department crews were blocking the road on Cross Street. 11:18 a.m. Rendered assistance to an Orchard Circle resident. 12:49 p.m. Officer spoke to a Redstone Lane resident who had received scam calls and filed a report. 1:13 p.m. A walk-in to the police station reported that her credit card had been used to make three fraudulent online purchases from Victoria’s Secret totaling $516.77. After confirming that no one in her family had used the card, she reported the issue to the credit card company, which issued her a new credit card, and she was not charged for the purchases, which had occurred precisely on the first day of the month in November, December and January. Information was shared with detectives to follow up with the company, and the woman said she would contact police if there were any other suspicious charges on her account. 2:18 p.m. Officer investigated a report of larceny, forgery or fraud on Hines Court. 5:42 p.m. Officer investigated a disturbance on Vine Street and filed a report. 8:43 p.m. Officer went to Reed Street to talk to a landlord about a dispute he was having with a contractor regarding what the landlord said was about $4,000 worth of unfinished work. The landlord understood that it was a civil matter but was looking for advice about ongoing harassing text messages the contractor was sending to both the landlord and his wife. Landlord said that the contractor had also been driving by his house and honking his horn repeatedly. Landlord had contacted other homeowners for whom the contractor had worked, and they reported having had similar problems. Officer explained to the landlord how to obtain a harassment prevention order and also advised him to document any past and future harassing messages from the contractor.

Thursday, Jan. 5

6:37 a.m. Officer investigated a general complaint on Creesy Street and filed a report. 7:45 a.m. Caller reported debris that needed to be cleaned up on Beacon Street. 7:55 a.m. Officer investigated a report that a car was blocking the road on Beach and Devereux streets. 9:54 a.m. Officer investigated a complaint regarding a boat on the street on Walnut Street. 11:26 a.m. Caller reported a problem with a traffic light on Pleasant Street. 12:37 p.m. Officer investigated a report of a possible package scam on Atlantic Avenue. It proved to be unfounded. 6:36 p.m. Officer investigated a report of a hit-and-run on Atlantic Avenue and filed a report. 8:35 p.m. Officers investigated a disturbance on Vine Street and filed a report. 8:57 p.m. Caller reported suspicious activity on Warren Road. 10:37 p.m. Officers investigated a report of suspicious activity on Humphrey Street.

Friday, Jan. 6

8:49 a.m. Alarm issues reported on Pleasant Street. 6:15 p.m. Officer met in the station with a man who had earlier in the day discovered an unauthorized transfer of $600 out of his bank account. He had already filed a fraud report with the bank. Man suspected that his ex-wife may have been responsible for the transfer, as she used to have access to the account. Officer said the information would be shared with detectives for further investigation. 6:31 p.m. A disabled vehicle was reported on Ocean and Harbor avenues. 9:56 p.m. A person was transported to the hospital after a caller reported an opioid overdose on Heritage Way. 10:18 p.m. Suspicious activity was investigated on Community Road.

Saturday, Jan. 7

11:41 a.m. A caller on Ocean Avenue reported having received a grandparent scam call. 5:48 p.m. A patrol officer noticed a yellow 2005 Toyota Highlander parked on Barnard Street with a 2022 validation sticker affixed to the rear plate, indicating that the registration was likely expired. Officer checked and discovered that the vehicle’s registration had been revoked since Feb. 14 and expired since Sept. 30 and that its inspection sticker had expired at the end of January. Officer seized the vehicle’s plates, and the vehicle was towed.

Sunday, Jan. 8

7:56 a.m. An officer investigated a disturbance reported on Creesy Street and filed a report. 10:01 a.m. A caller reported a flag was tangled in a tree on Pleasant Street. 3:03 p.m. An officer responded to the scene of a two-vehicle accident on Atlantic Avenue. There were no injuries. 4:02 p.m. Officer went to Cornell Road to investigate a nearby resident’s report of a hitand-run that had occurred the night before. Upon his arrival, the officer found a tree that had been knocked over in the front of a home and miscellaneous car parts in and around the tree. Officer spoke with the caller, who stated to me that she had heard a large bang sometime between 10 and 11 p.m. the night before. The resident had looked out the window but did not see anything.

The next morning, she had seen that the tree had been knocked over but did not notice the car parts until later. Officer then spoke to the woman’s neighbor across the street, where the home had a Ring doorbell camera installed. The officer asked the resident to check to see if the camera had picked up anything, and the resident said she would. Officer then was able to locate a serial number on the back of one of the car parts as well as “Honda” stamped on the back. An internet search revealed that the piece belonged to a 2019 to 2022 Honda HRV. The other pieces the officer collected had black paint. Upon his return to the station, the officer had a dispatcher run a search of any black Honda HRVs registered in town and found that there were five. He checked all five addresses and found four vehicles without damage. The fifth vehicle, which was registered to a Marblehead address, belonged to a Beverly resident. Beverly Police checked for damage to that vehicle and found none. Officer delivered the vehicle parts to the property room. 6:18 p.m. Officer investigated suspicious activity reported on Countryside Lane.

Monday, Jan. 9

11:16 a.m. Officer spoke at the police station with a woman who explained that she had been away from Thursday morning until Sunday night, during which her niece stayed at her home to look after her daughter. On Saturday, her daughter had found a set of keys on a table in the kitchen, and neither the woman’s daughter nor her niece knew anything about them or where they would have come from. The woman first reached out to her house cleaner who had been at the house on Thursday morning before the resident had left for her trip. The house cleaner said that the keys were not hers but that she had seen a pile of keys while cleaning, though the woman then sent the house cleaner a photo of the keys that had been found on Saturday, and they were not the same ones. The resident had checked the security footage from her front and rear doors but did not find anything. The keys did have a gym membership card attached to them, and the gym had provided the woman with a phone number associated with the membership. Woman used the internet to do a reverse search of the number, which gave her a name. The woman had then called the number on Sunday and left a voicemail, explaining that she had the keys. The woman heard back from a person via text message around 6:10 p.m. The person, who would not reveal his name, said he did not know how they lost his keys, which he claimed to have lost on Friday night in Brighton. He said that he had no idea how they ended up in Marblehead. The woman texted a picture of the keys, and the other person confirmed he was “pretty sure” they were his. The person then requested that she drop them off at the police station. The woman said that the keys had remained on the same table where they had been discovered until she brought them into the police station. When she went to get the keys to bring them to the police, the woman then noticed that a silver Tiffany interlocking circle chain bracelet valued at $350, which she had been planning to return, was missing from its box. The officer turned the keys over to detectives as evidence and did his own reverse search of the phone number, which returned the same name as the woman had gotten. 11:19 a.m. An officer investigated a disturbance on Smith Street.

11:57 a.m. An officer filed a report after conducting an investigation on Washington Street. 3:46 p.m. An officer assisted Nahant Police with an investigation on West Shore Drive and filed a report. 4:02 p.m. An officer was dispatched to Creesy Street to investigate a report of a stolen jacket. Resident explained that she had a black Michael Kors jacket with fur hanging on the back of the door, which was now missing. Inside the jacket were a Samsung smart phone, a blue vape, a set of keys, mints and a debit card. The woman stated that she had left the front door to the apartment open with the jacket hanging on the back of the door and had then gone to the back of the apartment to clean one of her dogs. All of a sudden, she heard the front door shut and found that her jacket had been taken. She then talked to her neighbor who acknowledged shutting her front door but said that she did not take the jacket. A short time later, the woman’s phone was placed on the floor outside of the apartment. There were no witnesses or any video footage. The officer then went to speak with the neighbor who again confirmed that she had closed the door of the other apartment because she had opened up her own door to let her dog out but then saw that the door to the other apartment was open with an unattended dog sitting on the couch. She closed the door so her dog and the dog on the couch did not get into an altercation. The neighbor offered to let the officer search her apartment for the jacket. Officer found two jackets matching the description, but when he brought them to the other woman, she said neither were hers, and the officer returned the jackets to the neighbor. Officer took the original caller’s phone as evidence and planned to report his findings to detectives. 4:13 p.m. A resident came to the police station to report possible bank fraud. After a few weeks went by without her receiving it, she made an inquiry at the bank, and a bank teller informed her that bank records showed that she had not only received the new card but had activated and used it. Woman then went home and found the unopened envelope with the card from the bank. Woman said the bank canceled the card, and she did not notice any money missing. Woman said she had talked to a police sergeant about another matter, which could be related to this one. Officer said he would forward his report to the sergeant. 10:08 p.m. Officers investigated a report of a missing person on State Street and filed a report. 11:20 p.m. A person was transported to the hospital after officers investigated a report of an opioid overdose on Washington Street.

Tuesday, Jan. 10

6:12 a.m. Officers investigated suspicious activity on Fort Sewall Lane. 9:32 a.m. While monitoring the intersection of Smith and Pleasant streets for red-light violations, an officer observed a white SUV go through the intersection several seconds after the light had turned red. After the officer had pulled the vehicle over and asked the driver for her license and registration, the driver asked why he had pulled her over, and the officer replied that she had run a red light. According to the officer’s report, the driver responded that there were several turkeys in the road, which she had to navigate around. The woman appeared agitated when the officer again asked for her license and registration and reiterated that she had been unable to stop due to the turkeys. Officer wrote in his report that he had not observed any turkeys in the area during the entire time he was monitoring traffic. Officer determined that the woman’s license was active but that her vehicle’s insurance had been revoked. By then, a lieutenant had arrived on scene, and both officers agreed that departmental policy required the vehicle to be towed. The driver did not like this answer, explaining that the car was new and that she was positive that the vehicle was insured. The officer said that they could revisit the issue if she could show him proof of insurance before the tow truck arrived. Driver eventually showed officers a screenshot of what appeared to be a sales receipt for the vehicle, which the officers agreed was not proof of insurance. The driver was then told she would need to exit the vehicle so that it could be towed. Woman became flustered upon being asked to locate the key to the vehicle. She told the officers, who were standing 3 and 10 feet away, that they were “crowding her,” according to the officer’s report. She eventually gave up on the search for the key and exited the vehicle, telling the officers, “This has been a most unpleasant experience. No wonder why everyone hates police officers.” 11:53 a.m. Officer investigated a report of larceny, forgery or fraud on Atlantic Avenue. 1:35 p.m. Officer investigated a report of a past hit-and-run on Ocean Avenue.

Wednesday, Jan. 11

7:28 a.m. Officers responded to the scene of a crash on Pond Street from which a vehicle had to be towed. 8:55 a.m. An officer assisted at the scene of a vehicle crash on Atlantic Avenue at Hawkes Street. 10:51 a.m. An officer spoke with a Jersey Street resident who had been using her computer the previous afternoon when the screen began to “scream” at her (make a loud annoying noise). In addition, a blinking phone number appeared on the screen along with the words, “You are in the process of being scammed.” In fear she was going to get scammed, the resident called the phone number on the screen. The man who answered the call instructed her to go to a certain website via the search bar and provide a username and password, which she did. But she then began to feel uncomfortable and reached out to her husband via cell phone while she was still on the landline with the unknown man. The husband instructed his wife to end the conversation, which she did, and they had since purchased a new home computer. She was advised to change any passwords she may have had on the old computer and keep an eye on her banking and credit accounts. In addition, the officer advised her to place a fraud alert on her credit in case there was any fraudulent activity. 5:29 p.m. An officer investigated a general complaint on Lee Street and filed a report.