Still missing
It was cold this week, but not as cold as the NYPD’s search for 7-year-old Patrick Alford.
As his heartbroken mother marks the one-year anniversary of the boy’s disappearance, cops have no new leads regarding his Jan. 22, 2010 disappearance from his foster family’s Starrett City/Spring Creek apartment building on Vandalia Avenue.
Alford was last seen leaving the lobby of his foster family’s building after threatening to run away. He had been placed in foster care after his biological mother, Jennifer Rodriguez, was arrested and the city determined her to be an unfit caregiver.
Police dogs tracked Alford’s scent to a bus stop two blocks away from his building.
In the intervening months, investigators, some on loan from the Canarsie’s 69th Precinct, tried to connect Alford’s disappearance to Rodriguez, who apparently knew where Alford’s foster parents lived, but the boy wasn’t with any extended family members.
After exhausting almost every possible lead, and no one biting at a $12,000 reward for information, cops underwent the morbid duty of “beating the weeds” along the Brooklyn-Queens border in April, looking for the child’s remains.
Over 100 officers joined in the April 8 search, which turned up nothing but animal bones.
As the search continues, Rodriguez is suing the city for losing her child.
“I pray to God that my son is safe. And whoever has him has to return him as soon as possible,” she told reporters this week as she remembered her son during a brief ceremony this weekend.
Cops are asking anyone with information regarding Alford’s disappearance to come forward.
Calls can be made to the NYPD CrimeStoppers hotline at (800) 577-TIPS. All calls will be kept confidential.
Commercial conundrum
Two Canarsie businesses were looted last week, both on Jan. 16.
Workers at the Country Butcher, which is on Avenue L near E. 93rd Street, told police that they closed for business Sunday evening, but sometime after midnight someone forced open the front door and jimmied the safe, taking $1,500.
At roughly the same time, someone forced the back door to a laundromat on Seaview Avenue near E. 95th Street, taking $600. The thieves had to raise a metal gate to get at the door, investigators noted.
Anyone with information regarding these two heists is urged to contact the 69th Precinct at (718) 257-6215. All calls will be kept confidential.
Store raid
Thugs held up a Flatbush Avenue store on Jan. 10, but were unable to open the safe.
Workers at the store, which is near Avenue M, said the suspects entered the store at 11 am, pulled a gun and then went behind the counter, where they emptied the register.
They then tried to open the safe, but left after they couldn’t budge the door.
Caught in the act
A thief busted his way into an Avenue I home on Jan. 13, but made a hasty retreat as soon as he was discovered.
The 17-year-old resident told police that she was inside the home, which is near E. 40th Street, at 1:30 pm when the thief kicked in the front door.
But when he realized she was watching him, he ran, escaping in a white van.
Opening rush
A trio of thieves jumped a Flatbush Avenue tattoo parlor employee just moments after he opened the store on Jan. 16.
The employee said he was raising the gates to his business, which is near Avenue N, at 2:05 pm when the goons attacked, leaving him with a deep cut that needed medical attention.
The thieves ran off with the victim’s wallet and tattoo license.
