Crime Nearby: Drunk Bus Driver Gets 1 Year

This story was posted by Pam Robinson. It was written by Jason Molinet.

A bus driver who was drunk at the wheel when he crashed into a Syosset home will serve one year in prison, according to the Nassau District Attorney's office.
 
Frederick Flowers, 67, of Massapequa Park, pleaded guilty to charges and was sentenced Monday to one year in prison, said the DA's office. Flowers admitted to Leandra's Law violations, DWI, reckless endangerment in the second degree, and endangering the welfare of a child.

In an incident Nassau detectives called "appalling," Flowers had been drunk at the wheel when he reportedly drove a bus into a Teibrook Avenue home at about 3:20 p.m. Oct. 4, 2012. Five children between the ages of 5-9 were on board at the time of the incident. None of the children were injured, according to reports.

Nude Picture Scam
A former Mitt Romney campaign intern from Great Neck was arrested by the FBI Tuesday, charged with Internet extortion and cyber stalking for allegedly using naked pictures of women as blackmail.  

Over a 10-month span beginning in May 2012, Adam Paul Savader, 21, sent anonymous text messages to 15 women threatening to release nude photographs of them to friends and family members unless the women sent him more nude photographs of themselves, according to the affidavit.  

Detectives in Ann Arbor partnered with FBI agents to investigate the case and together identified victims in Detroit; Washington, D.C.; and Long Island, the FBI said. Savader is currently in federal custody in New York awaiting removal to Michigan.

Fake Jitney Ticket Nets Arrest
An Amagansett man has been ordered held in lieu of $7,500 bail after being brought up on a felony charge for forging Hampton Jitney tickets, according to Southampton Town police.

Stratford Skalkos, 68, was charged with second-degree forgery, a felony, and theft of services, a misdemeanor, police said.
 
Hampton Jitney employees on a bus traveling from New York City to Bridgehampton Thursday became suspicious of a man who used what appeared to be a fake Hampton Ambassador ticket, police said. When officers responded to the Hampton Jitney office on County Road 39 in Southampton, they found that the passenger had numerous forged tickets on him. A one-way Hampton Ambassador ticket is valued at $45.

Gym Owner Gets Three Life Terms
A Dix Hills man who owned several fitness centers in Nassau County will spend the rest of his life in jail for his role in the murders of three men.

Christian Tarantino, 46, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Central Islip Wednesday. Following jury trials in 2011 and 2012, Tarantino was convicted of participating in an armored car robbery in June 1994 in Syosset during which a guard was shot and killed.

Tarantino was also found guilty of orchestrating the August 1994 murder of an associate in that robbery whose body Tarantino dumped from a boat several miles off the coast of Long Island.   

Cops: Drunk Driving With Kids, Part II
Police recently arrested two suspected drunk drivers whose children were along for the ride.  

Westhampton Beach Police found a man passed out in the parking lot of St. Mark's Church with his 2-year-old in the car. James J. Brennan, 37, of Shirley, told police on April 19 at 10 a.m. that he was waiting for his wife to pick him up.  

Brennan failed field sobriety tests and was charged with aggravated driving while intoxicated with a child 15 years or less, a felony under Leandra's Law. He was also charged with endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor. Brennan’s car was seized.

State Police made a traffic violation stop on the Meadowbrook Parkway, just south of the Southern State Parkway, Saturday. Tracy McCulloch, 38, of Merrick, allegedly failed sobriety tests and was arrested for driving while intoxicated. McCulloch had her two children inside the vehicle, troopers said.