According to reports, a 62-year-old Staten Island man has expressed a desire to move after being brutally attacked by a group of teenagers last month while on his daily evening walk.
Just after 7 p.m. on July 15, the man was walking near the intersection of Howard Avenue and Clove Road in the Sunnyside neighborhood when he began to be harassed by a group of thugs.
According to the video, street surveillance cameras captured the moment nine boys were seen chasing the man. Retrieved from silive.com.
One of the delinquents ran up behind the man, who then ran out into the middle of the busy road to avoid the group, while the rest of the group chased him from the other side of the road.
“He raised his fist and told me to pick one and I said, ‘I’m not interested,'” the man said. He told NBC New York. “I just thought it was a kid joking.
“I don’t know, maybe it pissed them off, I don’t know, but they were looking for trouble,” he added.
The man said the group, who were laughing, did not try to rob him or make any statements.
As the assault continued, the man ran away from the camera, but received several blows, leaving him with bruised knees and stitches on his fingers.
He recalled that the assailants fled the scene when they noticed others rushing to help the man lying on the road.
The man was taken to Richmond University Medical Center in West Brighton and suffered approximately $5,000 in medical bills for his injuries, according to silive.com.
“His mouth is a mess. He was caught off guard and kicked all over his body,” a relative of the victim told the outlet. “He didn’t expect someone to hit him and he fell face-first to the ground.”
The man claims the group had targeted multiple people prior to this disturbing incident.
“They had actually attacked two other people before I got there,” he told NBC New York, “so I was ambushed.”
Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella said he saw a video of a group of “young people” getting off a bus and walking up and down Clove Street for several minutes.
“They became hostile and eventually assaulted the individual who was taken to the hospital,” Fossella told silive.com.
“He was just walking down the street on a beautiful summer evening, minding his own business, and he was surrounded by a group of people,” Fossella said. “He ran down Clove Road and could have been hit by a car and died.”
“The point is, anybody’s grandparents could be assaulted while walking down the street just minding their own business, and that’s totally intolerable.”
The attack left the man afraid to go outside and even asking to be moved.
“I want to leave, I don’t want to live here anymore,” he said.
The New York Police Department arrested two minors on Thursday in connection with the July attack.
According to silive.com, two boys, ages 13 and 14, have been charged with assault with intent to inflict bodily harm.
