An Asian man was punched in the face on the Lower East Side by a homeless man who threw obscenities at an unprovoked attack that the NYPD has considered a possible hate crime, police said.
The unsuspecting victim parked his car in front of 196 Allen Street, near Houston Street, around 9 a.m. and checked to see if he was in a legal place when the attack took place, a spokesman for the Allen Allen said. NYPD.
There was a language barrier, but the victim told police he heard the attacker say the word “Chinese” several times, police said.
The attacker ran down Allen Street.
The NYPD spokesman said the incident is considered a possible hate crime and the New York Asian Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating. A police source said police believed the attacker was homeless because he was wearing a blanket.
Kat Lam, 30, told The Post she was picking up her morning coffee with her roommate, on the corner of Allen and Stanton and Houston streets, when she witnessed the end of the incident.
Lam described the assailant as tall and slender, about 20 to medium, with a brown sweatshirt and blanket.
“The homeless man started charging at the old gentleman, saying things like, ‘If I ever see you around, I’ll hit your ass.’ And, ‘I’ll hit your ass right now,'” Lam recalled. “He made it fall right in his face, just above his eye. You could say this old man was totally shocked. It was just frozen. ”
The assailant ran away when he realized there were witnesses, Lam said.
Police responded “very quickly” to the incident, Lam said, adding that the attack was “completely unwarranted.”
“It was hard not to get excited because he looked exactly like my dad,” she said through tears.
The assault came in the morning after Blasio mayor was frantic and surrounded by protesters at a Union Square vigil held to protest anti-Asian racism and mourn the victims of Georgia’s massacre.
The NYPD has recorded a 1,300 percent increase in anti-Asian hate crimes during the coronavirus pandemic and has stepped up patrols in Asian neighborhoods after the killings in the massage parlor.