A Bronx man who was left in a coma after being surprised and beaten by a convicted sex offender in a headline-grabbing case has slammed the justice system for giving his assailant a light sentence.
“It almost cost me my life,” Jesus Cortez Cabrera, 54, told The Washington Post in his first exclusive interview. “I wanted him to stay in prison forever.”
Cortez Cabrera had been hospitalized for three weeks following the horrific random attack in August 2022 when sexually-charged Van Phu Bui, 56, approached him outside Fuego Tipico restaurant in Fordham Manor and raped him from behind, according to security camera footage.
Cortez-Cabrera was then left lying on the sidewalk with a fractured skull, a broken cheekbone and bleeding on the brain.
Bui was sentenced in May to three-and-a-half to seven years in prison.
“He destroyed my life,” Cortez said. “Three years later, he [get] Outside?”
“When I saw the video … when I saw his face … he’s 100 percent a bad guy,” Cortez-Cabrera said.
Police initially charged Bui with attempted murder, but the local prosecutor’s office argued there was insufficient evidence to support the charge and reduced it to a non-bailable misdemeanor, and Bui was released after his arrest.
The move sparked outrage and, after criticism mounted, Governor Hochul stepped in and ordered the parolees returned to prison.
A month after the daring attack, Bui argued that because Cortez Cabrera survived, he shouldn’t be in custody. “It just doesn’t make sense,” he complained to The Washington Post in an exclusive jailhouse interview. “He’s alive. He’s not dead. I thank God he survived. I never wanted to hurt him that badly. I only hit him once.”
Cortez Cabrera may be alive, but Bui’s attack has had an irreparable impact on his life.
“He has destroyed my life,” Cortez Cabrera said. “Now I can’t even get a job. I can’t send money to my family in Mexico. My brother can’t do it alone. He gives me everything, but we’re two months behind on rent.”
The attack happened as Cortez-Cabrera was returning from an ATM to pay for dinner with his brother and brother-in-law.
“I paid my fare and went outside to go home,” Cortez-Cabrera recalled. “All I remember is that he hit me. I woke up in the hospital and thought I was home. I tried to walk but I couldn’t.”
Without the consent of Cortez Cabrera’s family, surgeons at Jacobi Medical Center performed life-saving surgery to stop bleeding on his brain and repair some of the 25 fractures he suffered in the attack.
He said he was confused when he woke up from surgery and was unable to tell doctors what day it was.
Cortez Cabrera said since the attack and her coma, she has had to relearn to walk through grueling physical therapy sessions.
“I was like a little baby,” he explained. “I had to learn everything. They asked me, ‘What color is this?’ I didn’t know. I was always scared. [thought] It may never recover.”
Cortez-Cabrera also recently underwent nose surgery to correct persistent breathing problems and will also require surgery on his arms and legs.
Though he’s still unable to return to football, Cortez Cabrera has returned to an old passion of his: teaching Mexican dancing to kids at his church.
“My brother Juan told me, ‘Hey, you can do it,'” Cortez-Cabrera said. “Seeing him crying gave me strength.”
Since being released from hospital, Cortez Cabrera has been seeing a doctor every week but continues to suffer from Bui’s actions.
“I wake up sometimes and feel a little dizzy,” he said, adding that he also has outstanding medical bills from the assault. “I’m on a lot of painkillers, heart attack and stroke medication. I’m afraid to walk outside. Whenever I see someone behind me, I see them again.”
Cortez-Cabrera said he has never watched the video of the attack in its entirety. “I don’t want to watch it,” he said.
Cortez-Cabrera believes “stricter laws” are needed to keep people like Bui off the streets, but he says the attack, while life-changing, has not destroyed his psyche.
“He didn’t take away my happiness because I continue to do the same thing as before,” Cortez Cabrera said. “I’m fine thanks to the programs with the children at the church. They helped me a lot. They prayed for me. They supported me. I’m happy that God gave me another chance to live and let me continue working with the children. Something may happen today, but I live in the present.”
