Man slashed in face in Times Square speaks out about attack
TIMES SQUARE, Manhattan (WABC) -- A man slashed in the face in Times Square Sunday night is now speaking out about the attack.
He claims his assailant shouted racial slurs at him and his friend, before pulling out the knife.
"He was like smiling to me, angry smile. Now I cut your (bleep) face (bleep)! What you you going to do?," said the victim, Elsayed Shalaby.
There was absolutely nothing funny for Shalaby about getting punched, cursed out and slashed in the face for no reason at all.
"Me and my friend, we don't do anything to him bad. We were walking. Normal people on the street," he said.
All Shalaby wanted to do was show his buddy who was visiting from Egypt the lights of Times Square at night. They were walking near West 46th Street and Broadway around 11:30 p.m. when they were targeted.
"My friend told me, he said, the people here, if they hit somebody they don't say sorry. I said what happened? He said the guy hit me," said Shalaby.
When the 42-year-old security guard confronted the suspect, he says Nestor Galindo became unhinged, using foul language, calling him the N-word, and telling him to go back to his country before physically attacking him.
"I felt something hit me in my neck in my back. And when I turned, he hit me in my face too," said Shalaby. "I look and I realize there's guy front of me with knife in his hand."
Shalaby says it was a small blade that left a two-inch cut on his right cheek. Galindo ran off, but couldn't outrun the former air marshal and part-time professional handball player.
"But I can protect myself. What if another person, I'm thinking, what if another person, he will cut his neck?," said Shalaby. "So God make it like reason to catch this guy, to take him away from another person."
Police quickly arrested the 33-year-old Galindo, of Fairway, New Jersey. He's facing charges of assault and criminal possession of a weapon.
Court records show Galindo has 16 prior arrests, including assault, criminal sex act and fare evasion. He served nearly two years in state prison for a drug possession conviction and was released in July 2014.
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