Subway Mayhem: One Person Killed on Tracks, Two Tourists Shoved by Unstable Woman
In two separate incidents on Aug. 5, a male victim was struck and killed by a subway train on the L line at Union Square. Earlier that same day, two twenty something women tourists from Mexico were shoved onto tracks at a downtown station but saved by bystanders. Cops arrested a woman described as mentally unstable at the scene.
| 09 Aug 2024 | 06:42
The FDNY and police emergency service vehicles responded to an Aug. 5 rush hour incident with a person dead on the tracks at Union Square. (
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Huge police and FDNY were on the scene at Union Sq. where a person was killed on the subway tracks below shortly before 7 p.m. (
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It was another day of subway mayhem on the Lower East Side.
On Aug. 5, shortly before 7 p.m. police said a person was killed on the tracks of the L train at the Union Square subway station. It had the earmarks of a suicide but no official cause of death had been released at presstime.
“Upon arrival, officers observed an unconscious and unresponsive 49-year-old male lying on the roadbed with trauma about the body. EMS responded and pronounced the aided deceased on scene,” according to police.
A massive response from police emergency vehicles and FDNY and EMT snarled rush hour traffic for multiple subway lines.
“The medical examiner will determine the cause of death and the investigation is ongoing,” police said. A week after the death, police still had not released the identity of the deceased, pending notification of the family.
It was the second major incident on a lower East Side subway that day. In the very early morning hours, a pair of Mexican tourists were shoved onto tracks at the Delancey and Essex Street station of around 2:15 a.m. by a woman describer by cops as emtionally disturbed.
The two victims, two women aged 27 and 28, were helped off the tracks by fellow straphangers.
Ebony Butts, 42, was arrested by police on the scene and charged with reckless endangerment. Police said she had shoved on woman onto the tracks and when a friend tried to come to her aid, Butts shoved the second person onto the tracks as well, in an unprovoked attack.
MTA chairman Janno Lieber praised police for their quick arrest while condemning yet another attrack on tourists in a train hub. “I am thrilled that these cops were there right away,” he said. “That’s the key.” But he said since the attacks were carried out against tourists it always hurts New Yorkers a bit more. “This was a couple of tourists,” he said. All of us New Yorkers that that hurts us a little bit when tourists have these terrible experiences.”
Family members spoke with the Daily News and said the woman was in need of psychiatric care and that they had tried for years to get her help. “My sister needs help,” said Tueniesha Butts, 47, the sister of the suspect. “It shouldn’t take for a time that she is hurting somebody for them to see that she needs help. And they put her in jail, but jail is not where she belongs.
”If somebody has mental health issues, the government and this country have enough money to help these people with mental disabilities before they go out and harm a citizen going to work or going to school, especially when their family is speaking up trying to get them help,” Tueniesha Butts continued. She told the News that she felt bad for the victims. “I hope they forgive my sister,” said