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Police have a 30-year-old former deli worker in custody believed to be the suspect who pushed a subway rider off the platform and into the path of an oncoming train at 49th Street after an argument.
Law enforcement sources say the suspect has made statements to detectives implicating himself in the deadly push.
A law enforcement official told NBC 4 New York the man is suspected of pushing 58-year-old Ki-Suk Han off the platform at the N, Q, R station Monday afternoon. Han was hit by a southbound Q train and died.
Witnesses told police the suspect was mumbling to himself before he and Han began arguing on the platform.
A bystander recorded part of the fight between the two men and turned the video over to police, who released it to the public Monday night, and received several tips. The man who allegedly pushed Han is heard cursing and saying, in substance, "Leave me alone... stand in line, wait for the R train and that's it."
He then pushed Han onto the tracks, police said. Han tried to climb back up onto the platform but died after getting trapped between the train and the platform's edge.
Read more news on NBCNewYork.com
The Q train operator, Terrence Legree, told the Daily News he saw the man in the tracks and tried to pull the emergency brakes on the train, but couldn't stop it in time. Even after he heard the sound of the train hitting the man and the locomotive screeched to a halt, Legree said he ran out of the control booth and tried to help the victim.
"If someone can be saved, you have to do what you have to do," Legree, a 21-year employee with the MTA, told the News. But Han couldn't be saved -- a tragic fact that had Legree struggling with an array of emotions and questions more than a day after the man's death.
“All kinds of emotions from ‘Why is this happening?’ to ‘Why was that guy down there?’ to ‘What happened?’” Legree told the News. He was treated for shock after the incident.
Police had released several photos and video clips of the suspect wanted for allegedly pushing Han into the path of Legree's train. A law enforcement official tells NBC 4 New York that co-workers from a nearby deli where the suspect works tipped off police that their colleague might be the subway pusher after they recognized his voice from video.
Investigators then saw the man on surveillance video in the street talking to street vendors outside the subway station, and when they went back to the area Tuesday, he was there, speaking with the same vendors, sources said.
One of the newsstand vendors told NBC 4 New York the suspect was a well-known face in the area and that he spoke to her Tuesday morning.
"I showed him the picture [released by police Monday] and he goes, 'Oh, that's not me,'" said Elizabeth Williston. "I said, 'Yeah, that's you!' Because yesterday, he had the beard, the hair. But today, he had shaved his head, shaved his mustache and everything."
Subway pushes are unusual. Among the more high-profile was the January 1999 death of Kendra Webdale. A former mental patient admitted he shoved her to her death.
Following that, the state Legislature passed Kendra's Law, which lets mental health authorities supervise patients who live outside institutions to make sure they are taking their medications and aren't a threat to safety.
R. Umar Abbasi, a freelance photographer for the New York Post, talks about the controversial photo he took of the man about to be hit by a subway train after being pushed onto the tracks, saying he was attempting to alert the driver and there was "no way" he could have rescued the man.
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when will we learn that city apes have their own agenda. if the man was white jesse jackson would be all over the news crying, no justice no peace.
He a black racist for pushing a chinese onto the tracks.....
I ride the subways in NYC now and then, and used to ride them daily. The one thing you always knew was to never engage a lunatic in conversation. Feign deafness if you must, but don't give them the opportunity to make you a target. I also never stand near the platform edge, and always have my back against the wall, so I can see it coming. Not seeing it coming is very disadvantageous. The colder the weather gets, the greater percentage of subway platform lunatics. Always assume that people who are talking loudly to themselves are loons, and try to maintain the greatest possible distance between them and yourself. Subway loons suck!
Kendras Law I imagine the health workers monitor there patients just like the cops with probation cases. Neither one knows where half the people are that they are watching.
He removed someone from this planet... NOW REMOVE HIM!
this is corporate america! they are not concerened with saving lives!! animal or human. there worried about losing a taxpayer!! the same goes for the federal goverment!! if you do not pay taxes,we don't care if you live or die! corparate america is not happy with doubling there money anymore,they want to tenfold it!!
live in there big houses,collect bonuses,even though their companies go broke!!!! take hostess for an example. you are expendible per your goverment!! you do not mattter!!! your vote means nothing!!!corparate america sucks!!! they will cheat you!! they will rob you!! the bank never loses,but they expect you to!! the feds know this!! do not watch television, remember orson welles broadcast!!
There is nothing wrong with the current gun laws. Guns are quite user friendly and a nice addition to every home. The problem lies with people being allowed to have these multi-faceted irresponsible unmonitored relations, and doing so under the blanket of being "cultural and non-prejudiced". Anyone, anywhere, anytime.
It seems to say "no" to a proposition puts one at the risk of being considered "stuck up". To date intraracially is suppose to be considered "prejudiced" and to date interracially is suppose to be considered "cultured". Unfortunately, people do not realize that they are playing the "Simon Says" game without knowing who Simon is. They just simply want to copulate and pervert themselves with as many folks as they can - for whatever reason - no one knows but them because they certainly cannot justify it under the label of being "socially mature or non-discriminating". That is pure bulloney, unreasonable and assynine.
Control these "silly, fermented, perverted, unequal relationships and it will solve 90% of the crimes to include homicides/suicides by guns. People hurting people is where the focus should be and leaves all guns LOADED!
This guy looks just like trybang martin, This guy looks directly related to al sharptouge and jj jacksoon
corparate america sucks!! they want to tenfold there money,this is a money thing!!! @!$%# them!! they are not interested in doubling there money anymore,they want to tenfold it!! the goverment is not interested in saving lives,there worried about losing a taxpayer!! so much for this guy!!i will never,ever, buy a newspaper again!! please go along with me!! america is driving itself out of business!! buy a chinese news paper like george bush does,@!$%# him!!!
This is exactly why I shun public transportation. I always drive to my job in Midtown Manhattan from New Jersey, safe and sound in my BMW SUV with heated leather seats. Beats the Q train any day.
What? No gun in use? We should ban all subways Darn it!
Ban all Subways!
Well I just have one thing to add.... last night my girlfriend and i was enjoying dinner and a nice conversation, and just because this nosey old lady who stuck her nose into our conversation because she didn’t like what we were talking about nor saying. So I gladly told her to piss off. If it’s true that this is racial motivated, and there is a longer video, since you have yet to provide any evidence of, but let’s go off this clip I seen, it looked like to me this guy was minding his own business and this guy refused to leave him alone. So I ask where you there? How in the hell do you know what happen? You’re making this guy out to be a bad guy, like Trayvon Martin. As far as from being from TX… if someone from another race got into your business, are you just going to be like whatever? You clearly stated in 4 gun storeys the had pictures with all though verbiages’ so you make a mute point and your also making an ass out of yourselves.
Trains don't kill people.....People kill people!!!
I am sick of you lopw lifes calling every crime a hate crime unless it is done to a white person you racist hunks of crap.
Glad I don,t live in New York,YUCK!!!!!
One person here said it was a Racial Hate crime but we all know that Blacks aren't Racist, Don't we?
I hope this is the person responsible. Sooner he's off the street, the better. If he's the guilty party, I hope he spends the rest of his miserable life behind bars. No parole.
So, at the end of the day you have "2 bystanders" that could have saved this man's life. But, no instead of saving his life, 1 was recording the whole incident on video 2. was taking photos, within that time lapse, one of them could have rescued him. They should be convicted along with the suspected killer.
Ever notice anytime somebody does something wrong, they pass a new law? Apparently pushing a person in front of a moving train needs a law. What happened to the law entitled "murder". It seems to be all encompassing!!!
Of course he's black. Probably high on crack
Just another case of a video cell phone accusing the wrong downtrodden poor black man for killing an asian in a business suit. It must have been a case of a look alike on the video.... Racism, Racism just because you are black and are caught killing a person doesn't mean you are guilty
Obama will parton you don't wory kill another innocent bystander at the tracks....Political correctness will save you
and to think I had big plans for freeing people from chains
Abe lincoln
Oh well...another goofy, urban street negro. Very popular in the Northeast. Yo...Yo...Yo shawty...it's ya birthday....gonna party like it's ya birthday. Not sure why anyone would want to live in Philly and large parts of NYC with all those nuts roaming around. Somehow nutty blacks aren't defined as "crazy" in the US....because its just their culture.
how can the cops keep tabs on the thousands of mentally ill folks, to make sure they are taking their meds....did i read that right?
The cops can't do much of anything....just goof off, mess with people for fun, write reports after the fact, tell victims "oh well, there's nothing we can do," and find any way to give people traffic tickets. I guess only time they care is if an important person has been raped or killed...then all kinds of CSI stuff comes into play. For the average Joe, it often remains an unsolved case.
I can see why your a pauper.
Another useless n*gg*r taking another innocent life. If it was the other way around, the nigs would say it was a racial hate crime.
Post racial American right?
Hey RRT and the rest of you #$%^ing bigots, Wahhh, Wahhh, Wahhh!! Move back to Europe where your cave dwelling ancestors came from and you'll be much happy and in much Whiter surroundings. After all why would you want to live in a country where a N*gg*r is President? How embarrased you must feel that out of all your heroes you couldn't find one to beat a N*gg*r, now that is sad.