Woman Punched outside Washington Square Park, Suspect Still At Large
A female NYU administrator was punched outside Washington Square Park on April 17. NYU and NYPD are investigating it as a potential hate crime.
| 22 Apr 2024 | 06:05
NYU administrator punched outside Washington Square Park being investigated as a potential hatecrime (
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Despite several arrests, the series of punching incidents against women in the city have not come to a halt. The most recent case of assault occurred outside Washington Square Park against a New York University Administrator on April 17. The incident occurred on the south sidewalk of Washington Square North between 5th Avenue and Washington Square West.
The 27-year-old female NYU administrator was walking when an unknown individual punched her in the face without any provocation at about 10:36 a.m. The suspect fled the scene, leaving the victim bruised and hurt. Emergency Services responded to the scene to treat her.
The incident was reported to NYU’s Campus Safety at 12:28 p.m. after which they sent out a University-wide campus safety alert at 5:31 pm.
The Alert mentioned it as an Assault/Hate crime with a description of the suspect. It mentions, “The suspect was described as male-presenting, 5’6” to 5’7”, with a slim build and dark complexion, wearing a gray hoodie sweatshirt (hood up), grey sweatpants, and black sneakers.”
This incident was reported to the NYPD on the same day which further notified The NYPD Hate Crime Task Force. There have been no arrests yet related to the incident and investigation remain ongoing.
Since mid-March over fourteen women have reported being punched unexpectedly in the city. At least one woman suffered a broken nose, while others endured severely bruised and swollen faces. Four arrests have been made in connection with these punching incidents, where both offenders were charged with misdemeanor assault. Surprisingly, while overall crime rates in the city have decreased since last year, misdemeanor assaults have been on the rise.
The number of random assaults were up slightly in March, according to the NYPD statistics, but it showed the the number of random assualts below 42nd St. had actually declined in the first quarter.
A number of the assaults took place against women in the their 20s and early 30s and several of the women took to TikTok after they were attacked to warn the public.