The Police Log is a digest of reports filed by the Johnston Police. Chief Richard S. Tamburini or Deputy Chief David DeCesare has reviewed all reports
WRONG PEDAL
An 87-year-old driver explained to police that she stepped on the gas instead of the brake around 1:15 p.m. on July 29, which sent her 2005 Taurus into the front of the La Nuova Pizzeria on Hartford Avenue. Patrolman Derick Ofori reported that there was damage to the bumper and hood of her car and that the front window of the restaurant was shattered but still intact within the frame. Ofori said there did not appear to be any structural damage to the building but he called building inspector Ben Nascenzi and advised him of the incident and Nascenzi said he would come right over to review the damages. The owner arrived to assess the damage and told Ofori he would have the window replaced that day. The vehicle was towed from the scene and police gave the woman a ride home.
SCRAPPER ARRESTED
A Cranston man was arrested on July 26 and charged with stealing more than $3,000 worth of electrical equipment from a construction site on the National Grid easement near Central Avenue. Det. Thomas Dwyer took a report from the contractor, in which the contractor said a number of pieces of electrical equipment had gone missing over several weeks, including the headlamps of a work truck at the site. Dwyer said he went to a local scrap metal dealer and showed him pictures of the equipment. The dealer showed Dwyer a shopping cart filled with electrical equipment that matched the photos. The contractor came to the dealer and identified the contents of the cart as their property. The dealer supplied the detective with an invoice indicating who brought the stuff in and was paid $101, and video of the whole transaction, including pictures of the truck and the suspect, identified as Jonathan Silva, 24, of 61 Mohawk Trail in Cranston. Dwyer said Silva came to headquarters and gave a statement in which he claimed he was fishing behind the FedEx building during the evening of July 24 and observed a bunch of scrap metal in the woods that he did not believe belonged to anyone. He said he loaded it into his pickup truck and sold it to the scrap dealer the next day. Nevertheless, he was charged with larceny over $1,500 and later released with a summons.
MORE SCRAP MISSING
Patrolman John DeAngelis reported a housebreak on Pleasant Street on July 27. A neighbor told DeAngelis she had been checking up on the vacant house from time to time and noticed an extra chair in the backyard, one that was not there two days before. She told him she checked the rear of the house and noticed that the basement door was open and when she looked inside she saw that the ceiling had been pulled down and all the copper water pipes were gone, and she called police. DeAngelis said he went inside the house himself and learned that the first and second floors of the house were stripped of all their pipes. He said an open window on the second floor might have been how the perpetrators got into the house and he believed they carried the pipe out through the basement door. BCI was called to process the scene. He said he contacted the owner of the house who told him he last checked on the house two weeks before and everything was intact. He told DeAngelis he couldn’t think of any suspects and the neighbors told DeAngelis they saw no suspicious activity at the house.
LETHAL CONTACT
Patrolman Joseph Scichilone reported he was dispatched to the scene of an occupational accident on Country View Drive around 12:15 p.m. on July 30. He said Johnston Rescue was already on the scene attending to the victim as they transported him to Rhode Island Hospital. He said he spoke with the victim’s employer who said the man was standing on a 12-foot aluminum ladder using a metal extension trimmer on a Japanese maple at the bottom of the driveway when the trimmer came into contact with an electric service wire and he was electrocuted. The lawn care contractor told Scichilone the force knocked the man to the ground and he called 911 and administered CPR to the man until Rescue arrived. Another witness corroborated the contractor story and provided a statement.
Scichilone said National Grid arrived on the scene and cut the power to the line and told Scichilone the victim touched what is known as a single-phase wire that carries 12,500 volts of electricity. Scichilone said an OSHA Compliance Safety and Health Officer arrived and took pictures of the scene and said he would be seizing the extension trimmer and a tree limb as evidence. Prior to leaving the scene, Scichilone was notified by Battalion Chief Jeff Moroni that the victim, Leonardo Estrada, 23, of 24 Lowell St. in Providence, had succumbed to his injuries and was pronounced dead at the hospital.
