The Big Apple’s top cop took his first tour of Queens’ sleazy migrant “Market of Sweethearts” over the weekend, vowing to crack down as sex workers and illegal vendors openly peddled their wares around him.
“We’ve always taken it serious, but we’re gonna kick up to another level,” Interim NYPD Commissioner Tom Donlon said of enforcement as he walked through Roosevelt Avenue’s hotbed of illicit behavior on Saturday night with other department brass, NYPD video shows.
“I’m out here for the first time, but I want to come out here again,” he told Queens North patrol borough Assistant Chief Christine Bastendenbeck. “You know, once a week, twice a week, because this is very very important, and the public wants to see how we’re addressing this.”
Nearby sex workers strolled the streets and migrant vendors peddled stolen goods on the sidewalk — part of a surging pattern of crime along the strip that is driving local residents crazy and frustrating cops, whose periodic raids have failed to halt the madness.
“What goes on on Roosevelt Avenue is a lot of different conditions here,” Bastendenbeck told the commissioner. “If you take a look around, you’ll see that we have folks that are vending on the corner, you’ll see women that are scantily clad on the street, offering services or massages.
“So we do have a lot of prostitution that goes on here,” she said. “It is a team effort that we use here with our patrol officers, our vice officers — a really big collaboration to address the issues that are [on]going.”
The Post has repeatedly reported on the troubled strip, where migrant gangs have set up sex-trafficking operations and goods stolen by migrant hoods are sold.
“We appreciate the police commissioner visiting Roosevelt Avenue,”said Democratic district leader Hiram Monserrate, a member of the Let’s Improve Roosevelt Avenue Coalition, to The Post on Sunday. “It would have been great to see him at the community’s rally last week.
“Nonetheless, the commissioner heard our cries for help. This lawlessness did not happen overnight and has been on full display for well over a year. The community is looking forward to seeing results.”
Cops have tried before: In January, for example, the NYPD raided and shut down a dozen brothels along the avenue, describing their “inhumane conditions.”
In September, a 24-hour brothel dubbed “the worst of the worst” was also padlocked
Periodic raids of the area’s illicit sidewalk vendors have occurred, too, although the busts have failed to deter the illegal vendors from coming back after police left.
