Miss Heather

UPDATE, 3:15 p.m. Smitty writes:

update on the dead guy- they found a note scrawled on a piece of plywood, and there’s a polish guy trying to read it, there’s five cops all with their notepads out

UPDATE, 7/8/09; 1:45 p.m.: I have it per a reliable source this was a suicide. Apparently the man in question (a Polish gentleman who was reputedly homeless) left a note (on a piece of plywood, no less) and hung himself. His body had decomposed quite a bit by the time it was discovered. This begs the question how many more derelict construction sites in north Brooklyn have been or will be employed for nefarious purposes? My guess: quite a few.

It should also be noted the property in question, 141 Dupont Street (also known as 98 Clay Street) has quite a history of non-compliance per the Department of Building’s web site.

Not that the Department of Buildings has seen fit to actually do anything about this, of course.

The Gowanus Lounge (at my prompting, it should be added) wrote about 141 Dupont Street as far back as March 7, 2007. Robert Guskind also wrote about this site again on April 4, 2007 and June 21, 2007. In the former he quite presciently opined:

…Not be cynical, but one can sense the tragic way this could go. A couple of children will be injured or killed somewhere in Greenpoint or Williamsburg, where there are dozens, if not hundreds of demolition and construction sites with flimsy fences and ones that are open wide enough for a child. Afterwards, the Department of Buildings will finally react….The interesting question is why the Department of Buildings doesn’t devote a couple of hours to the task. We don’t feature these things because we’ve got a fence fetish. Rather, every time we see one, we picture a child, a pet, or the occasional idiotic drunk stumbling into one spots and getting hurt or killed.

Or, as we have learned today: killing one’s self.