Brutal NYC prepare operator stabbing prompts calls from union for MTA to ramp up subway security

The town’s largest transit staff’ union is demanding that the MTA ramp up security measures on the finish of subway strains within the wake of the brutal stabbing of prepare operator Myran Pollack in Brooklyn final week. 

Members of the Transport Employees Union Native 100 — which represents greater than 40,000 bus and subway staff — rallied Thursday outdoors the Crown Heights-Utica Avenue station on the finish of the No. 4 line, the identical cease the place a recidivist attacker stabbed 60-year-old Pollack twice on Oct. 8. 

“We want actual motion now. Our members are going through unacceptable risks, and the present insurance policies simply aren’t reducing it,” Richard Davis, President of TWU Native 100, stated in a press release.  

“It’s time for the MTA to step up and take accountability for safeguarding the employees who hold this metropolis operating.”

The union is pushing for a change to rules in order that transit workers not work alone whereas taking trains out of service. 

They’re urging that conductors and prepare operators stroll the cleared-out prepare collectively to make sure that no passengers are nonetheless on board. 

Over the previous three years, 31 MTA staff have been assaulted whereas cleansing out trains, “additional proving the pressing want for security reforms,” the union stated. 

In Pollack’s case, he was trying to wash out the prepare alone when he requested lingering passenger Jonathan Davalos, 27, to depart, authorities stated. 

As a substitute of complying, Davalos allegedly flew right into a rage, following Pollack onto the platform earlier than attacking him so viciously that he required at the very least two surgical procedures. 

The union can also be calling for MTA police to be current in any respect stations the place trains are evacuated – in order that they’re readily available to assist if passengers flip violent.

“These aren’t simply solutions—they’re life-saving measures,” Canella Gomez, TWU Native 100 Fast Transit Operations Vice President stated in a press release. “Our members ought to by no means must face these risks alone. We want stronger insurance policies and sooner responses to maintain our individuals secure.”

Union members are moreover pushing for frequent conferences between high MTA officers and TWU Native 100 “to assessment and implement enhanced security protocols for frontline staff.”

“Transit staff should be revered and guarded!” union members chanted on the Thursday gathering. “Sufficient is sufficient!” 

Some held indicators that learn, “We don’t come to work to be punching baggage” and “Have been you secure in the present day or simply fortunate?”

The most recent NYPD information – which covers the interval from Jan. 1 by Oct. 6 – signifies that assaults on MTA subway workers throughout the town have dipped to 30 from the 44 reported throughout the identical timeframe in 2023. 

In a single such incident final month, Robert Ray, 33, randomly punched a feminine station agent within the face in Midtown, claiming he did it as a result of “as a result of the voices in my head had been speaking to me,” prosecutors stated. 

In late Might, an on-duty MTA conductor was socked within the face as he tried to interrupt up a struggle at a Queens subway station, authorities stated.

Earlier that month, a prepare operator was clearing a Queens prepare of passengers so it could possibly be taken to a lay-up location when a crazed commuter tackled him, knocking him to the ground of the automotive, police stated.

One other conductor was randomly whacked within the head with a glass bottle by an unhinged stranger within the Bronx again in March, cops stated. 

Interim NYC Transit President Demetrius Crichlow didn’t immediately handle the union’s calls for however stated the MTA is working to maintain repeat offenders off the streets.

“Earlier than his heinous assault on a prepare operator, Jonathan Davalos had on totally different days attacked one other subway worker and a rider,” Crichlow stated in a Friday assertion.

“This recidivist habits is why the MTA has fought in Albany for harsher penalties for crimes occurring within the transit system, and why we push for essentially the most aggressive doable prosecutions when workers, clients and police are assaulted,” the assertion stated.

“We’re glad to have TWU Native 100 be part of that effort, and to have their help for the NYPD and the district attorneys, as they work to make sure that most doable penalties are imposed.”

An company spokesman stated that the MTA will proceed to debate security issues with its “labor companions.”