- Residents claim they are the 'forgotten victims' of Sandy
- Also say that lack of power and law enforcement means more looting and violent crime
- Those in stricken areas stockpiling weapons like kitchen knives, machetes, and bats to protect themselves
- Coney Island residents say they are forced to 'scavenge for food like animals'
- Power unlikely to be returned to Brooklyn, Queen's and Staten Island until sometime next week
With little police presence on the storm-ravaged streets, many residents of the peninsula have been forced to take their protection into their own hands, arming themselves with guns, baseball bats and even bows and arrows to ward off thugs seeking to loot their homes.
It has been reported that crooks have been disguising themselves as Long Island Power Authority workers and coming by homes on the peninsula in the middle of the night while real utility workers were nowhere to be found.
'We booby-trapped our door and keep a baseball bat beside our bed,' Danielle Harris, 34, told the New York Daily News.
The woman added that she has been hearing gunshots likely fired in the nearby housing project for three nights in a row.
Meanwhile, local surfer Keone Singlehurst said that he stockpiled knives, a machete and a bow and arrow.