Tape of her 911 call on 2nd threat after Chelsea blast
SHE SAW something, said something — and likely saved lives.
A 911 call played in a Manhattan federal courtroom detailed the calm, collected thoughts of a Chelsea resident on high alert after an explosion only a few blocks from her apartment, court proceedings revealed.
Jane Schreibman told the Daily News on Tuesday that she doubted herself as she dialed 911 to report a pressure cooker sitting on the sidewalk next to a mailbox on W. 27th St., moments after a bomb went off four blocks away, leaving 30 people hurt.
The professional photographer testified Monday during the trial of Ahmad Rahimi, the New Jersey man accused of planting the pressure cooker bombs in Manhattan on Sept. 17, 2016, and leading cops on a dayslong manhunt.
Schreibman, who lives just down the street from where she saw the unexploded device, played down her heroics as she told jurors that “something caught my eye.”
The bomb was in a suitcase, until two men came along, swiped the suitcase and left the pressure cooker on the street.
Concern and doubt mingle in Schreibman’s voice in the 911 call as she describes what she sees to a dispatcher.
“There’s like a pot that’s taped shut and has wires coming out of it, and it goes into another bag,” Schreibman tells the police dispatcher in the call. “It just looks like it could — it looks like it could be a bomb, and I know there was a bomb on 23rd, an explosion.”
The chaos that enveloped the city that night seemed to creep into the call as the operator misunderstood her at first, asking how long ago the explosion took place. “No, no, there was no explosion, I just said I saw this pot with wires coming out of it on the street,” Schreibman replies.
“Twenty-seventh St., yeah. Let me see if I see a job around here, OK?” the dispatcher continues. “Let me see if this is the same thing . . . there’s a pot wrapped up with duct tape hanging with wires out?”
“Yeah, yeah. Someone already called?” Schreibman replied.
“Yeah, hold on . . . . Pot wrapped up with tape and wires hanging out?” “Yes,” Schreibman said. “All right. And, uhm, it looks suspicious?” “Yes,” Schreibman answered. Shortly thereafter, the operator assures Schreibman the object was responders’ top priority and that “help is on the way.”
“They’ll be there as soon as possible,” the operator said, before the pair go back and forth on the address again.
“It seemed like she was slow at grasping what I was trying to communicate and didn’t get the address, and I know I said that slowly and clearly,” Schreibman, 67, told The News. “But she was reassuring to me.
“I mean, she was nice to me, I felt a little silly calling because I didn’t really believe it was a bomb, she sort of reassured me someone else had called,” she added.
Schreibman was honored in May with the New York State Liberty Medal, the highest civilian honor bestowed by a member of the state Senate, for her “selflessness and quick thinking.”
The NYPD declined to comment on the call.
Rahimi, 29, is facing eight charges related to the bombing and the device that Schreibman found.
On Tuesday, the second full day of his trial, several experts testified alongside witnesses who described videos, presented Monday, showing the moments of the 23rd St. blast.
Rahimi, who is also being prosecuted in New Jersey for allegedly placing bombs in Elizabeth and Seaside Park, was ushered out of the courtroom a day earlier after complaining that he had not been allowed a fair amount of family visits while behind bars.