Page 5 - Aruba Today

U.S. NEWS A5
Friday 29 January 2016

Spate of random slashings across New York City sows fear

Tony-Award winning playwright David Henry Hwang is shown at dence. Investigators be- try to knock someone out there is less crime in this
The Public Theater in New York. Wang was a victim of a random lieve they were committed with a single punch. The city than there has been at
attach while carrying groceries to his home in Brooklyn, N.Y: by different, unconnected attacks seem random, but any time in the last 25 to 50
having been slashed so deeply that it severed an artery leading people. But the sheer ran- there’s often a connection, years.”
to the brain that required emergency surgery. domness of the crimes has even if it’s just in motive. Chief of Detectives Robert
reinforced old fears about “They want to create anxi- Boyce said the spate was
(AP Photo/Jim Cooper) safety in a city of strangers. ety, to feel powerful, to “a little unusual for us,” but
“I like to think that, as laugh at the results,” said he disregarded the idea
a New Yorker, I’m fairly criminologist Jack Levin of a copycat crime. He
aware — conscious of peo- of Northeastern University, said officials were working
ple around me,” Hwang who studies the crime. quickly to arrest the perpe-
said. “But this happened on There has been an uptick trators. At least three peo-
a dark corner of my block. in knife attacks citywide ple have been arrested
This was a random attack, the past few months, but already. One man was ac-
and the number of recent police statistics don’t dis- cused of slashing a 71-year-
random attacks surprises tinguish between random old woman on the cheek
me. Is this a new phenom- and targeted attacks. And as she rode the subway to
enon?” overall crime is near mod- work. Another man with a
The idea of a “thrill crime,” ern-era lows. history of assault arrests was
where the perpetra- Commissioner William Brat- charged with an unpro-
tor seeks to feel power- ton said this week that voked slashing attack on a
ful through an attack on crime is inescapable. man from New Jersey who
a stranger, is not new: A “The reality is we still have was in the city to have din-
good example, criminolo- crime in New York City. ner with friends. The victim
gists say, is the knockout We’ll always have crime in that assault needed 150
assault that surfaces occa- in New York City,” he said. stitches to close the wound
sionally, where teenagers “But the reality is also that in his face.q

COLLEEN LONG who came out of nowhere.
VERENA DOBNIK The wound was so deep it
Associated Press severed an artery leading
NEW YORK (AP) — Tony- to his brain.
award winning playwright He isn’t the only victim of
David Henry Hwang was such an unusual crime.
carrying groceries down a Since December, about a
Brooklyn street when he felt dozen such random, un-
like he got hit in the back provoked slashings have
of the head. He suddenly been reported across the
couldn’t walk straight. city, including three this
“I kept veering into a wall, week on subway trains. All
then a parked car. And were committed by strang-
that’s when I realized I was ers, police said. They used
bleeding,” Hwang, the au- knives, razors and, in one
thor of “M. Butterfly,” said instance, possibly a ma-
this week. chete.
Hwang had been slashed Police say the spate of at-
with a blade by someone tacks is largely a coinci-

Computer expert gets no jail
in extensive spamming case

JOE MANDAK ligence who has unfortu-
Associated Press nately succumbed to di-
PITTSBURGH (AP) — A recting those talents in the
computer expert was sen- wrong way.”
tenced Thursday to two Ahmed cooperated with
years’ probation for help- investigators “the moment
ing send millions of spam he got the knock on the
messages that allowed door” from federal agents,
computer marketers to il- Vatz said.
legally harvest email ad- Ahmed was a systems ad-
dresses and phone num- ministrator and master’s
bers. degree student at the Uni-
Naveed Ahmed, 27, faced versity of South Florida. He
at least two years in prison lost his job but gained a
under advisory sentencing wife since pleading guilty
guidelines, but Senior U.S. in August.
District Judge Maurice Co- Cohill’s sentence will allow
hill Jr. imposed probation. Ahmed to work with com-
Defense attorney Melvin puters that will be moni-
Vatz called Ahmed “a tored by federal probation
man of considerable intel- officers.q