A robber kicks a 57-year-old woman down the stairs and hits her repeatedly on the head with a hammer in new York a subway station just days after Mayor Eric Adams vowed to crack down on violence in the transit system.
A shocking video in front of the Queens Plaza train station shows a thief walking with a cane approaching an unidentified woman as she carefully descends the stairs to a subway platform on Thursday night.
The man starts kicking her in the back, trying to knock her down, but when the victim continues to fight and seems to be trying to escape slowly, he pulls out a hammer.
He continues to hit her in the head 13 times while she fights, the last blow knocking her down.
The suspect then grabbed her bag and fled. No one has been arrested and he has not yet been identified.
Officers found the woman lying on the ground, with a broken skull and a torn head. She was transported to a nearby hospital, where she is in critical condition.
The attack comes a week after Adams announced his initiative for a subway safety plan and sent 1,000 additional staff and teams of health workers to curb rising crime in the subways.
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The thief kicked the woman down the stairs at Queens Plaza Subway Station and continued to pull out a hammer and attack her.
He hit her head 13 times with a weapon and stole her purse
The suspect slowly got out of the subway with a crane and a hammer in his hand
Police are investigating the case and are looking for the man they say attacked the woman on Thursday night.
Adams said NYPD staff will be located on lines A, E, 1, 2, N and R and that service workers will be part of End of the Line teams with staff to make sure trains are released during their final stops.
Health workers will be there to help the mentally ill and refer them to city support services, while staff are focused on enforcing laws against bedtime, sleeping, stretching, dumping, drug use and aggressive behavior toward riders.
The plan comes after a series of recent crimes committed by homeless people, including a breakdancer who was stabbed by a homeless man last Thursday and the murder of Michel Go, in which the 40-year-old was pushed into a train last month by a homeless man with a history of mental illness.
“Let’s make this clear, [the homeless] they are not dangerous, “Adams said. The vast majority are not dangerous, but we must be honest about the number of people who deal with mental health crises. They are dangerous to themselves and dangerous to New Yorkers.
The mayor’s plan received support from Governor Kati Hochul, who said the state would supply 600 new psychiatric beds and another 500 beds to shelters in the city to try to provide assistance to those currently living in the subways, many of whom suffer from severe mental illness.
“We will achieve what New Yorkers deserve, and that is safe travel in our subway system, while acknowledging the very real humanitarian crisis that has been unfolding before our eyes for too long.”
New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a new initiative for a subway safety plan on Friday as a way to curb crime and violence in the city’s transportation system
Gov. Katie Hochul said the state is investing more than $ 39 billion in beds to meet New York’s mental health needs, including 1,100 beds for the city
The city has deployed an additional 1,000 staff to patrol the subway system since Friday
But despite their efforts, crime continues to plague the city’s transportation system, which serves more than 3 million people every day.
New York’s subway drills and cuts have risen 29 percent in the past year, 182 incidents, compared with 141 in the previous year in 2020.
And 2022 will be even worse. So far this year, there have been 27 attacks on subway passengers – a 35% increase over the 20 reported for the same period in 2021.
One of the latest victims, a Trader Joe employee named Kevin Young, was cut several times on the face, arm and behind the ear after accidentally crashing into a disturbed passenger on 12 February.
The incident happened around 5:45 a.m. at Union Square Subway Station on East 14th Street when Young tried to get off train Q south on his way to work to start his shift at 6 p.m.
“Subway crime is out of control,” Young, 36, told The New York Post.
“He’s trying to get on the train, and I’m trying to get out, and after a bump match, he catches his blade,” Young recalls.
“I tried to defend myself as much as possible. As soon as I detained him, he took his blade and set to work.
Young needed 25 stitches to close his wounds, and underwent surgery at Bellevue Hospital on Thursday to repair nerve damage to his left middle finger during the attack.
“And I have to put tiles with pins in my right index finger so the bones can grow back,” he groaned.
His attacker, who has not yet been identified or arrested as of Saturday, was last seen wearing a black jacket, black jeans, a black Adidas bag and glasses, police said.
The attack on Young comes just days after a 39-year-old woman was cut in the forehead by another woman with a boxing knife while traveling by train 5 on 59th Street and Lexington Avenue.