‘Brower Boys’ allegedly used rooftops for burglaries; busted after Facebook fight

 

JAY STREET — Yesterday Kings County District Attorney Charles J. Hynes and New York City Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly announced a 102-count indictment against 14 members of a Crown Heights street gang, the “Brower Boys,” which committed burglaries, assaults and robberies, in the vicinity of Brower Park, right next to the Brooklyn Children’s Museum.

 

“These Brower Bums terrorized their neighborhood for one long year, but now their cycle of crime is over,” District Attorney Hynes said.  

            

The defendants are charged with climbing fire escapes and traversing rooftops to access apartments, in a yearlong burglary spree spanning from April 2011 to March 2012. The defendants range from 13 to 19 years old, including two juvenile offenders. 

 

They stole mainly electronic equipment, like cell phones, laptops, cameras and video games, which they would later pawn, according to the indictment. 

 

 “Although some were as young as 13, the Brower Boys were old hands at burglaries and worse — victimizing neighbors, but making the mistake of fighting over the proceeds on Facebook, which led keen NYPD Anti-Crime officers in the 77th Precinct to monitor and arrest them,” Commissioner Kelly said.

 

Most of the break-ins occurred when residents were not home, but in one incident, four defendants, Derrin Dyson, 18; Dezhaun Samuels, 18; Christopher Scott, 17; and a 13-year-old juvenile, allegedly tied up the male and female residents of an apartment, threatened to kill them if they called the police, robbed the apartment, and Dyson and Scott allegedly sexually assaulted the female resident.

 

On another occasion, defendant Terry Walley, 18, allegedly shot a resident of a home the defendant was burglarizing and suffered his own gunshot wound in a struggle with the victim, according to the indictment. 

 

Dyson, Samuels and defendant Andre Valentino, 18, are also charged with burglarizing an apartment on Christmas Day 2011, by climbing to the roof of Samuel’s building and traversing neighboring rooftops, before climbing down the victim’s fire escape and entering through a window.

Members of the NYPD Burglary, Larceny And Surveillance Team (BLAST) made video recordings of several defendants entering and leaving apartment windows, climbing up and down fire-escape ladders and stairs, and running across rooftops.