The two men who were arrested on Saturday at New York’s Penn Station with an 8-inch hunting knife and an illegal firearm with a 30-round magazine, and described by police as a “developing threat to the Jewish community,” have been charged on Sunday with multiple felony counts, including criminal possession of a weapon and making a terrorist threat (Police Foil Attack on NY Jewish Community with Arrests at Penn Station).
The men are Christopher Brown, 21, of Aquebogue in Suffolk County, and Matthew Mahrer, 22, of Manhattan. Police found in Brown’s possession a Swastika arm patch and ski mask (In case he wanted to go skiing with fellow Nazis?).
Police also retrieved a Glock-style pistol, a large-capacity magazine, and 17 9-mm bullets in a bag in an apartment building on the Upper West Side Saturday night. The two men were captured on video walking into the building and exiting 45 minutes or so later with Mahrer appearing to be carrying the bag.
The NY Times cited law enforcement officials who said the two were planning attacks on Jewish sites, including “shooting up a synagogue,” as they declared in social media posts, and were planning to carry out the attacks last Friday.
Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg said that “a potential tragedy was averted when they were intercepted by police officers at Penn Station, given that online postings indicated an intent to use these weapons at a Manhattan synagogue.”
Governor Kathy Hochul tweeted Sunday: “Amid recent threats to Jewish & LGBTQ communities, I have directed NYS Police to ramp up monitoring and increase support for communities that are potential targets of hate crimes. Here in New York, violence or bigotry will never be tolerated. We stand united against hate.”
As always, it’s heartwarming for Jews to be lumped together with the homosexual community as targets of hate, something we’ve been doing since the late 1930s in Germany…
