Exclusive: Mom speaks out after random groping while walking with kids in Brooklyn
SUNSET PARK, Brooklyn (WABC) -- A woman walking with a child and pushing another in a stroller fell to the ground after she was groped in a random assault in Brooklyn, and police are hoping surveillance video of the suspect will lead to an arrest.
The incident happened just before 10:30 p.m. on Sunday, May 1, in the vicinity of 64th Street and 9th Avenue in Sunset Park, and now, the victim is speaking exclusively to Eyewitness News.
The victim, 41-year-old Maria Perez, was walking with the two children and a dog when the unknown man approached her from behind and slapped her buttocks.
Even now, the single mother said she is uneasy watching video of the man attacking her, and she says her 4-year-old daughter is traumatized.
"She cried, and now she's afraid to go outside because she knows there's a monster," she said. "And when we go walking, she doesn't want to go on the side where it happened."
She said she noticed the suspect following her, and at one point he appeared to be on his cell. She crossed the street, but he followed.
Perez attempted to stop the man from grabbing her, and as a result, she and the children fell to the concrete.
"That's when I pulled his hand away, and that's when I tripped and I fell on top of my girls," she said. "I didn't get hurt, but my daughter split her lip open and scraped her nose and forehead."
The suspect fled the scene.
The assailant is described as a male with a light complexion and dark hair. He was last seen wearing a navy blue polo style short sleeved shirt, tan pants and white sneakers.
"What were you thinking, while I was walking with two kids?" Perez said. "That's mentally wrong. That's not right."
Anyone with information in regard to this incident is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).
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