Police are warning Oahu residents that the department does not typically send out emails notifying people about gang-related activity and that a recent spate of alerts ostensibly from HPD are bogus.

Most information police disseminate to the public is relayed through official media releases, or via Honolulu Crimestoppers, the department’s Facebook page and through Nixle’s text and email notification system, spokeswoman Caroline Sluyter said.

A recent chain letter making its way to Oahu-based email addresses prompted police to issue Friday’s advisory.

One version of the rambling email is titled "Hono­lulu Police Department (HPD) Warning." It warns the email’s recipients to "Don’t Stop!!!" if they see an infant car seat on the side of the road. The letter explains that one person who alerted police about the car seat was told "gangs and thieves are now plotting different ways to get a person (mostly women) to stop their vehicle and get out of the car."

Women who stop "will be dragged into the woods, beaten and raped, and usually left for dead!" the email said. Men are "usually beaten and robbed and maybe left for dead, too," the email said.

The email, using all capital letters, also warns motorists not to stop their cars if raw eggs are thrown on their windshields "because eggs mixed with water become milky and block your vision, and you are then forced to stop beside the road and become a victim of these criminals."

A search of the hoax-busting websites scopes.com and urbanlegends.about. com show the fake email messages first circulated in 2009.