Back to school and taking up painting

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. But teach a man to fish, and he’ll likely break into your college to steal a shirt.

Officers with the 50th Precinct responded to a reported break-in at 3825 Corlear Ave., which houses Manhattan College’s engineering school, just after midnight on Jan. 29.

A 6-foot-2 gray-haired white man broke into the building in the middle of the night, according to a report, and he wasn’t looking for spreadsheets or architect’s renderings. He was more into art.

The man was caught on a security camera opening a paint can and hurling its contents at the building, according to police.

The man was arrested the same day, charging him with burglary and criminal mischief.

Victim gets wrong kind of surprise

One woman found that criminals don’t discriminate — if they think the coast is clear.

A 38-year-old woman told police that two men clad in black approached her on the southeast corner of West 233rd Street and Albany Crescent just after sunrise on Jan. 27. One perp grabbed her from behind and, according to a police report, told her to “give me all your money, quick.”

Fearing for her safety, the woman handed over $600 cash just to see the men dash off down Albany Crescent, she told cops. Worse yet, the men wore masks, so she couldn’t give police any identifying information.

A window no more

Few things are acceptable excuses for being late to work, except maybe a big hole where a vehicle window used to be.

Sometime between 4:30 p.m., on Jan. 17 and 1:30 p.m., on Jan. 20, police said a troublemaker smashed the front passenger-side window of a work van parked at the Spuyten Duyvil Metro-North train station off Edsall Avenue. The owner told police he noticed whomever it was moved items around inside the 2018 Ford, but took nothing.

Thankfully, the train station cameras caught the whole thing, police said.