Sag Harbor Village Police charged a Brooklyn man, Yosef Follman, 33, with attempted assault in the second degree, using a deadly weapon, namely, a car, on Saturday evening.
The victim, police said, was a Sag Harbor Village traffic control officer. Police said Follman was driving a four-door 2024 Mercedes-Benz north on Main Street in the southbound lane, then backed into a parking space facing the wrong direction from the flow of traffic. A traffic control officer approached Follman and pointed out his “wrongdoing,” the report reads, with the TCO then asking him to correct the way he was parked. But instead of correcting, according to the report, Follman and his passengers all exited the car. The TCO told police she warned Follman that she would have to write a parking ticket because of the way he had parked, but he walked away, before returning and becoming confrontational, the report indicates.
Follman then got back into it his car, the report says, started the engine, and put the vehicle in drive, “aggressively” pulling out of the parking space, abruptly veering straight at the TCO, who told officers that she would’ve been struck if she had not moved out of the way. The TCO said that she was, in fact, “fearful for her life” at that moment.
Police responded quickly, questioning Follman, then placing him under arrest. Besides the felony charge, he was also charged with a misdemeanor, menacing in the second degree, as well as being written up for numerous traffic and parking citations. After being taken to headquarters and processed, Follman was released, to be arraigned in Sag Harbor Village Justice Court next week.
The incident was the second case this summer season in which a TCO has been either struck or threatened with being struck by a vehicle, according to police.
