A 65-year-old Haredi Orthodox man from London visiting New York for his grandson’s wedding was attacked early Tuesday morning in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Borough Park as he left the wedding reception.
The attackers smashed their victim’s face into the sidewalk, and he was treated at a local hospital for a split lip and chipped tooth.
Nothing was stolen, indicating the man was a victim of “knockout punch” attackers, but New York police and a Brooklyn councilman differ on whether that was the case.
A spate of knockout attacks in New York in recent months appeared to target identifiably Jewish people. Other incidents have occurred in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., as well as other states.
“Simply put, there is no place for this type of heinous behavior in our city, as nobody should be afraid to walk the streets of their community at any time of day or night,” New York City Councilman David Greenfield, who represents Brooklyn, said in a statement. Greenfield believes it was a knockout attack.
New York police are not calling it a knockout attack because the victim was not punched as they were in previous attacks, according to the New York Daily News.