Manhattan DA says more work needs to be done on 'stranger assaults' after random attacks on women
NEW YORK (WABC) -- Attacks on two women in Manhattan are "very disturbing," Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in announcing indictments against suspects in two unrelated cases.
"I don't know why people are being assaulted in all instances," Bragg said. "What I can say is that we are bringing charges when it happens. We are holding people who are accountable who are doing that."
The attacks were seemingly random: one last month in Chinatown where an 80-year-old woman was sexually assaulted and one in October in Midtown where a young woman was grabbed, thrown into a garbage heap and smothered.
Jaheem Warren, 33, is charged with murdering 23-year-old Leslie Torres.
On October 29, Torres was followed around Midtown for about 25 minutes by Warren, who ultimately engaged her in conversation outside of a hotel on West 46th Street.
Officials say he grabbed Torres from behind, threw her onto a pile of plastic garbage bags and smothered her, leaving her face down in the trash. She died after a week on a ventilator in a hospital intensive care unit.
Warren was indicted on second-degree murder charges. Hernandez was indicted on attempted rape and sexual abuse. Both were arraigned Wednesday.
"We are sadly bringing more and more of these kinds of cases when we see this conduct," Bragg said. "It is disturbing, it is terrifying. And that's accurate. I live here, my family's here, my friends are here. We are processing this as humans. And when you hear about one of these incidents, they're deeply frightening. That's why we have to send the message that there's deep accountability for this."
Bragg knows these random assaults are terrifying for New Yorkers.
Even as crime in Manhattan overall is dropping, the district attorney said he goes to sleep thinking about ways to combat these kinds of incidents.
"We get up thinking about this every single day. We go to sleep thinking about it. We work on it in between," Bragg said.
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