Teens arrested for tormenting take-out

Since November, a group of teenagers has targeted Foo-Hing Kitchen in a series of attacks.

Video from a surveillance camera at the 2895 Sedgwick Ave. Chinese take-out restaurant shows the group throwing eggs into the store, slashing the tires of a delivery bicycle and threatening the establishment’s employees with violence.

On March 24, police arrested two teenagers, ages 14 and 15, on second-degree felony assault charges after attacking one of the restaurant’s deliverymen. The store’s owner, Tao Lin, believes the suspects were the same people who have been targeting him.

In an email, a spokesman for the 50th Precinct said officers have increased patrols in the vicinity of the restaurant.

“We are working closely with Mr. Lin, the owner of Foo-Hing,” added Officer Juan Ventura.

He said everything started after he refused service to a teenager. The owner, who speaks limited English, said the youth had previously come into the restaurant and ordered a meal without paying several times.

Mr. Lin said on Nov. 16, that person shot a BB gun at his restaurant from across the street, leaving marks on the window. The owner called the police to report the incident, and an officer gave him a report that labeled the crime as criminal mischief, a misdemeanor charge.

In the office of his landlord, John Bogovic, Mr. Lin showed this report to The Press, along with four others describing related incidents. Mr. Lin said as far as he knows, police did not take action against the teens at that time, and the attacks continued to worsen.

In December, a small group of teens came into the store, one holding what appeared to be a long stick. Mr. Lin said they made threatening movements and told his staff, “I’m going to kill you.”

In January, one teen threw a large piece of ice at the restaurant, shattering a window. Mr. Lin has these incidents documented on security footage that he showed The Press.

“I feel every day as though I need to watch out. I can’t do nothing — no more business,” he said. “The delivery guy and the kitchen help, they quit. They’re afraid to go outside to deliver.”

Mr. Bogovic, Mr. Lin’s landlord, said he believes the teens are students at the New School for Leadership and the Arts (M.S. 244, NSLA), a middle school around the corner from the restaurant.

“You know what’s sad: 95 percent of those kids are good kids. It’s just those few that are really bad,” said Mr. Bogovic.

NSLA’s dean of students, Anthony Letizia, said he has seen the footage from Foo-Hing’s security camera. He said he believes the teenagers involved are mostly in high school, but confirmed that at least two of them currently attend NSLA. He said he has tried to work with the students and their parents to put an end to the situation.

“The playbook has always been, include the parents. If we’re worried about something, we call the parents,” he said. He noted that many parents in the neighborhood work long hours, possibly far from the area, which means students can be left unsupervised.

According to Mr. Letizia, most of the trouble comes from a group of young people who hang out in the park across the restaurant. He described them as a “wannabe gang.”

“They try to suck our kids, or any kids from the neighborhood. It’s difficult, but we do our best,” he said. He explained that he and the school’s principal, Eduardo Mora, will often go to the park after dismissal to monitor their students.

“It’s two or three [students] out of 800. That’s less than 1 percent,” he said of the troublemakers. “But we can’t control who hangs out in the park.”

Mr. Letizia said he offered to go to the precinct and help identify the teens in the video, but due to their age, police officers declined the help. The 50th Precinct did not respond to questions asking for clarification on this issue.

Mr. Bogovic said the police told him something similar when he and Mr. Lin went to the 50th Precinct to complain about the harassment.

“I went with [Mr. Lin] three times and basically, the times I went with him, the policeman said to me, he’s underage, and that breaking his window was not an arrestable crime,” said Mr. Bogovic, referring to the teen who broke the window with a chunk of ice. “And I left shaking my head.”