QUEENS, NY - A Brooklyn man has been charged with attempted murder after allegedly stabbing a fellow passenger who asked him to quiet down during a cellphone call on an E train in Queens. Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced that 50-year-old Johnny Wood was arraigned on charges including attempted murder, assault, and weapon possession following the violent encounter. The incident occurred around 11 a.m. on November 22 aboard a World Trade Center-bound E train stopped at the Jamaica Center-Parsons/Archer station.
After living in New York City for a decade, it's safe to say I've ridden the subway and the bus a thousand times over. I've taken public transport to work, to friends' apartments, and home from bars in the dead of night. And while you undoubtedly need to keep your wits about you, it would be untrue to say that riding public transportation in New York is a danger in and of itself.
Zarutska was fatally stabbed by a fellow passenger who sat behind her in what appeared to be an unprovoked attack. Police have since arrested DeCarlos Brown Jr., who reportedly had a history of violent crime and whose mother said he had began acting "aggressive at home" following a recent schizophrenia diagnosis. (Experts emphasize that the vast majority of people with schizophrenia never commit violence, and are in fact 14 times more likely to be victims of violent crime than its perpetrators.)