Captain
Frederick Ill Jr.
Ladder 2

9-11-2001

Subway Rider in Midtown Is Pushed in Front of Train
April 29, 1999 By ANDREW JACOBS

In a scene witnessed by scores of horrified commuters, a Bronx man had both of his legs severed Wednesday when he was pushed in front of an oncoming subway train in a midtown station at the height of the evening rush hour, officials said.

Witnesses said the victim appeared to have been randomly shoved in front of an uptown No. 6 train in the 51st Street station, one of the busiest in the subway system, at 5:40 P.M. A group of passengers seized and held down the accused attacker, Julio Perez, 43, who the police said may be homeless and mentally ill. Perez was being questioned at a nearby precinct station house and had not been charged as of last night with any crime.

The witnesses on the platform said Perez had been acting strangely moments before the incident.

The victim, Edgar Rivera, 46, was taken to Bellevue Hospital Center, where doctors were trying to reattach his legs Wednesday night. Rivera also suffered severe head wounds after he was struck by the train, which witnesses said screeched to a halt as Rivera was sprawled on the tracks. The police say Perez and Rivera did not know each other.

It is the second time this year that a subway rider has been pushed from a platform by a stranger. In January, Kendra Webdale, a 32-year-old receptionist, was killed after she was shoved in front of an approaching N train at the 23d Street station in Manhattan. The police arrested a Queens
man, Andrew Goldstein, who had been undergoing treatment for schizophrenia. Goldstein is awaiting trial on murder charges.

Last night's incident occurred as thousands of commuters were pouring into the subway station, a busy transfer point between the E and F lines and the No. 6 trains. Service on the uptown No. 6 line was suspended for two hours last night as the police investigated the incident.

Several witnesses said Wednesday that the suspect's odd behavior was especially disturbing because of the crowds of commuters on the platform.

"You see people like that all the time in the subway, but usually you can just move away," said Barbara Fisher, 48, an insurance executive who was standing nearby. "In this case, there was nowhere to go."

Passengers said that when one man asked Perez to move away from him, he became agitated. "He punched the wall," said one witness, a 40-year-old engineer from the Bronx who identified himself only as Josh. "Then he swung around and five seconds later he just pushed this guy. I saw him lose his balance. He yelled, 'Oh my God,' and then he fell."

With only seconds before the train's arrival, witnesses said that Rivera crawled to the platform's edge and kneeled down with his face to the wall and his legs draped over the tracks. Two cars passed over Rivera, who was pulled from between the second and third cars.

Rescue workers said that one of Rivera's legs was severed at mid-thigh and the other below the knee.

Many people who saw the first two cars of the train pass over Rivera thought he could not possibly have survived, said Fire Capt. Fred Ill of Ladder Company 2 on 51st Street, who was one of the first rescuers on the scene.

"People were reporting to us that he was dead," Captain Ill said. "But when I looked down between the two cars and shined the flashlight down at him, his eyes opened up and he looked at me."

Captain Ill said it took three men to pull Rivera from between the cars and up onto the platform. His legs, he added, "were both just laying there. It was tangled and mangled. It was a mess."

Captain Ill said Rivera remained conscious but was unable to speak during the rescue. "I spoke to him but all he could do was moan," Captain Ill said. "His eyes were aware, but I think he was really going into shock."

Subway pushings are relatively rare, but the random nature of the attacks represents the worst fears of commuters.

Prior to the attack on Ms. Webdale, the most recent victim was a 50-year-old woman who was pushed to the tracks and injured in 1997 by a man who was apparently angry because he thought she had made him miss his train.

In 1996, a 20-year-old aspiring model from Brooklyn died after being pushed in front of an M train by a youth who was trying to mug her. The year before, a 63-year-old woman was killed at Herald Square when she was pushed in front of a train by a man who had recently escaped from a state psychiatric center.

Wednesday night, as they were turned away from the entrance to the 51st Street station, commuters said they were shocked by another random pushing so soon after the one that killed Ms. Webdale. "It really makes you think twice about going into the subway," said Gaby Baxter, 35, a paralegal from Westchester County. "As it is, I am always afraid on the platform and I
stand as close to the wall as possible."

Others complained that the Lexington Avenue line had become increasingly more crowded. "It's so chaotic that it makes nice people very nasty," said Kevin Morrison, 30, a legal assistant who lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. "It's gotten to the point that I'd rather walk out of my way than take the Lex."