The New York City police said a 16-year-old girl has been arrested after an incident last week in which she allegedly assaulted an Asian American woman and harassed her family, as well as a bystander who filmed the altercation.
The girl was arrested Tuesday night in southern Manhattan and was charged with two counts of assault, according to an NYPD spokesperson.
The suspect and other two girls were recorded appearing to berate the victim and her family on the subway, lunging at them as well as other passengers who attempted to defuse the situation. One of the individuals pulled the victim by her hair and made an “anti-ethnic remark,” the NYPD said in a statement.
New York County Defender Services indicated that they are not representing the suspect and representatives at Legal Aid were unable to inform NBC News whether the suspect is being represented by their office.
The NYPD has said the incident is being investigated as a hate crime. The victim has come forward as Sue Young, a 51-year-old tourist from Nevada who was on the train with her husband and twin daughters. Young said in a statement that she was “relieved” to hear that the suspect was in police custody but she did not believe the suspect should be charged with a hate crime because race did not play a “primary role” in the attack. She did not support jail time for her, either.
“We all want her to be held accountable for her actions. Everybody deserves safety on the subway. But now the hard part begins. What is the appropriate intervention for this teen?” Young said. “We hope to come to an understanding with the other party, through a professionally mediated discussion, and we want the world to know about it.”
Young also said in the statement that she hoped to “decrease the racial tension” between the Black and Asian communities, which she feels has been worsened by the incident.
“We hope to start a discussion about how to prevent future incidents like this. We can all do something to help — at home, in schools, and in the community,” Young said.
Joanna Lin, the bystander who recorded the incident and was allegedly attacked as well, said she hopes the teen can issue an apology to her and Young.
“I also hope she gets the therapy, counseling and mentorship needed to move up from here,” Lin said in a separate statement. “Let this be a lesson to our community to not bully others.”
Video of the incident went viral after it was posted on Twitter this past weekend. Lin previously told NBC News that she was also attacked after the suspect saw her filming the incident.
“I’ve also had self defense training so I know to cover parts of my head that are vital. So I just took the blow and immediately after that, I was like, ‘OK, this is awful, it could get even worse,’” Lin said. “So I called the cops right after the first hit.”
Police have said that the investigation is ongoing.
Young previously mentioned that while the three individuals need to be held accountable, she said she hoped for “productive” consequences, “not something that’s just filled with just hate and anger.”
“These are very young girls. Somebody or something or some circumstance has made a big impression on them — whether it’s historical pressure, societal pressure, social pressure,” Young previously said. “Using law enforcement to curtail this, I’m not sure if that’s going to fix the problem. It just seems like it’s a more underlying issue that we, as a society and as a community, need to hold everybody accountable, not just law enforcement.”
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
