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UPDATE: Shelter Island Bay Constable assists gov’s brother and other man

REPORTER FILE PHOTO | A Shelter Island Police Department boat under way four.
REPORTER FILE PHOTO | A Shelter Island Police Department boat under way.

Shelter Island Bay Constable Peter Vielbig assisted two men Sunday afternoon who were chest deep in water on the Island’s shore of Peconic Bay.

One of the men was Chris Cuomo, a CNN anchor and brother of Governor Andrew Cuomo.

Mr. Vielbig said he was on patrol off Crescent Beach Sunday afternoon in the North Channel, just east of Jenning’s Point, when he saw the two men waving from the shore area.

This area is near the Sunset Beach Hotel, where many boats are anchored on summer weekends. The channel is also known for rapidly moving currents.

The bay constable took them on board and returned them to their anchored boats.

According to the Shelter Island Police Department, “both persons appeared safe and not in any distress.”

Mr. Cuomo told the police he had assisted the other man, whose identity hasn’t been released, who had apparently been swimming off his boat, “[He] apparently had been swept by the tide earlier,” Mr. Cuomo told police.

Shelter Island Police Department Chief Jim Read said a report in the New York Post, which headlined the story, “Chris Cuomo saves drowning man in Hamptons,” is inaccurate.

“If he’d been drowning, we wouldn’t have returned him to his boat, but taken him to the hospital,” Chief Read said.

Mr. Cuomo, who gave police a Southampton address, couldn’t be reached for comment, but discussed the incident Tuesday morning on the CNN program. “New Day,” which he hosts.

He had noticed the man swimming and then having trouble. “He didn’t judge the current right, and as he came by us I said, ‘How you doing?’ He didn’t look right,” Mr. Cuomo said on the program.

He then went into the bay and assisted the man to a place where they could stand near the shore.

Mr. Vielbig came by and picked them up a few minutes later, according to police reports.