D.A.: Define assault, protect transit workers

Andrew S. Garib, METRO New York | Link | PDF | New York. More New Yorkers who attack MTA workers should be charged with felony assault, but that won’t happen without a change in the law, the Brooklyn District Attorney said yesterday.

Charles J. Hynes said the current law, enacted in 2002 in order to protect conductors, train operators, bus drivers and station agents, doesn’t define an assault clearly enough. That leaves certain crimes against MTA workers — including punches resulting in stitches, “what you and I would consider assault” — as non-felony violations, Hynes said.

“The threshold [for what constitutes assault] is not well defined,” Hynes said. “We hope to get a simple change in the law” that would mean any attack which results in stitches or worse could be prosecuted as a felony.

There were 185 attacks on transit workers resulting in lost time, plus about twice as many that didn’t require time off, according to Transit Workers Union President Roger Toussaint.

Published 08.07.23 02:00:00 -0500 GMT | Posted by Andrew Garib on 08.07.23 | |

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