Police Arrest Suspect In Homophobic Subway Assault That Fractured Woman's Spine
Dec. 13, 2018, 2:34 p.m.
The man who allegedly sucker-punched a woman on the E train because he thought she was a lesbian, hitting her so hard she fractured her spine, has been arrested.
The NYPD has arrested a man who allegedly sucker-punched a woman on the E train because he thought she was a lesbian, hitting her so hard she fractured her spine.
Police say that Harlem resident Allasheed Allah, 54, has been arrested in connection with the November incident. He has been charged with assault as a hate crime and aggravated harassment as a hate crime. The NYPD Hate Crime Task Force took him into custody late Wednesday; his arraignment was pending in Queens Criminal Court on Thursday.
The Hate Crimes Task Force @NYPDHateCrimes has just arrested Allah Allahseed, wanted for an anti-sexual-orientation-motivated assault on a female couple on 11-30-18 on a Queens subway. Once again, NYC has made it clear: we have #NoPlaceForHate pic.twitter.com/QKD60AwiaX
— Chief Dermot F. Shea (@NYPDDetectives) December 13, 2018
The assault happened just after 5 p.m. Friday, November 30th, in Queens on a Manhattan-bound E train. The 20-year-old woman and a friend were killing time making Snapchats when they exchanged a kiss on the cheek. After that kiss, Allah allegedly began making homophobic remarks to them. "He said, 'do those gay things in front of me one more time and watch what happens,'" the victim said.
They got into a shouting match, during which Allah reportedly called her a "dyke." The woman and her friend started to walk away from Allah when he allegedly crept up behind them. "I felt him right behind me, I felt a punch in my back," she said. "And it all happened so quick it was just a blur."
It was more than just one punch: "I turned around and he already had his hand on my chest and he threw me back which caused my head to hit the pole and my back hit the ground first, which fractured my spine," the woman said. She said others on the train got up to protect her, and the man fled the train at the next stop at Forest Hills-71st Ave.
The victim was taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center with a fractured spine. "Last week I spent the whole week crying and in excruciating pain," the women told ABC7. "My hopes are that he's arrested, not for revenge, it's not what I want. So he won't ever do this to anyone else. I don't want someone else to feel this."
