Cops nab ex-con in Qns. subway beating

A 65-year-old ex-con has been arrested for bashing a stranger with a pipe inside a Queens train station where a Brazilian tourist had been attacked two days earlier, police said Saturday.

Ricky Wilson was apprehended in Fresh Meadow, Queens, for the Feb. 17 attack inside the Queens Plaza E, M and R train station on Feb. 15.

Wilson got into an argument with a 31-year-old man in the Long Island City station just before 1 a.m., cops said. As the argument escalated, Wilson allegedly bashed his victim in the head several times with the pipe, then ran off, cops said.

Medics took the victim to New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell in stable condition with cuts to his head, cops said.

Surveillance images of Wilson were shared with the media a day after the attack.

Cops tracked Wilson down on Monday and charged him with assault and weapons possession. A judge ordered him held on bail of $5,000 cash or $10,000 bond during a brief arraignment hearing Tuesday.

Wilson lives in a hotel converted into a homeless shelter in Brooklyn, cops said.

In 1980 Wilson was sentenced to five years in prison following a robbery conviction in Queens, according to court documents. He was released in 1985.

The suspect who slashed a 29-yearold Brazilian tourist in the Queens Plaza station on Feb. 15 remained at large on Saturday.

Without saying a word, the stranger lunged forward with a knife and slashed the left side of the victim’s neck before running out of the station. Medics took the victim to Elmhurst Hospital where he was treated and released.

The back-to-back attacks come as the NYPD tackles a 13% jump in crime in the city’s subway system, including an 11% increase in assaults.

As of Sunday, NYPD transit cops have investigated 86 assaults in the city’s subways compared to 77 by this time last year.

There have also been three homicides in the first two months of the year on the city’s rails — compared to zero by this point last year.

The NYPD has added another 1,000 cops to the city’s transit system in light of the uptick in violence, officials announced earlier this week.

Anyone with information regarding the Feb. 15 attacker is urged to call NYPD Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS.