‘HE’S JUST A BAD PERSON’
Ex-cabbie recalls being robbed, terrorized in 2012 by man shot on train
The man fighting for his life after he was shot with his own gun during a bloody, caught-on-camera brawl on a Brooklyn subway train was part of a stickup crew that robbed a livery cab driver in Queens more than a decade ago — a violent holdup that still haunts the victim.
“They were trying to kill me that day,” the former livery-cab driver told the Daily News, stunned to learn that one of the three suspects in the October 2012 robbery tried to shoot another man on a packed A train Thursday night, but was instead shot twice in the head.
“[There] was some sharp knife,” the cabbie recalled. “He wanted to cut my throat. I just took my hand and covered my neck, so he just caught my hand.”
On Saturday, the 36-year-old gun-wielding man remained in critical condition while being treated at a hospital for the wounds he suffered on the subway train — which besides the shots to his head include one shot to his neck and another to his chest. The man was shot with his own gun by a younger man who wrested it from him. The wounded man is not being named by The News.
The younger man who shot the hospitalized 36-year-old was taken into custody at the Hoyt-Schermerhorn station in downtown Brooklyn following the 4:45 p.m. shooting that sent panicked straphangers running to the other side of the train car.
The Brooklyn district attorney’s office declined to file charges against the younger man. “Evidence of self-defense precludes us from filing any criminal charges against the shooter,” a spokesman for the DA’s office said Friday.
In the Oct. 12, 2012, livery cab incident, the cab driver was rolling through Queens early in the morning when the alleged subway gunman and two other men flagged him down.
As the cabbie took them to Linden Blvd. and 177th St. in St. Albans, one of the suspects put a knife to his throat and started rifling through his pockets, said the cabbie, who wished not to be named.
“Just shoot him already!” one of the suspects screamed, according to court papers.
“I had to fight for my life,” the cabbie recalled. “I just put the car in drive and stepped on the gas — Vroom! Vroom! Vroom!”
The cabbie nearly collided with a police vehicle near the corner, he said.
The officers arrested the three suspects, and found the cabbie’s cell phone next to the future alleged subway gunman and the victim’s cash in his pocket.
A second suspect had the driver’s ring, officials said.
“I was traumatized by that thing,” said the cabbie, who suffered a cut finger during
the mugging.
His brush with death led him to give up the cabbie life and he’s now a security guard on Long Island.
“My wife — she can’t trust anybody,” he said. “That was too much. You’re driving, and someone tries to kill you.”
All three men were charged with first-degree robbery and weapons possession.
The future alleged subway gunman was convicted in 2014 and served five years in prison before he was put on parole, which ended in 2022.
During the future alleged subway gunman’s parole hearing, the cab driver asked that he serve his prison full term.
“Let them be there for all the years they’re supposed to be there,” he said.
The alleged subway gunman was living in Brooklyn in supportive housing before Thursday’s near-fatal clash on the Manhattan-bound train.
He was caught on video yelling at the man who ultimately shot him, screaming, “You think it’s OK for you people to beat up cops?” — leading some to believe the victim mistook the other man for an asylum seeker like the ones accused of assaulting two police officers outside a Times Square shelter.
“He thinks you’re a migrant,” a woman can be heard screaming on the video, which was viewed by The News. “He thinks you’re an immigrant.”
The duo did not appear to know each other before the scuffle on the train, police said.
As the train continued on, the two came to blows, with the gunman eventually holding the other man down with the weight of his body.
Shocking video shows a woman on the train who may have been with the younger man repeatedly striking the gunman in the back as he exclaims, “You stabbed me? You stabbed me in the back?”
After a civilian broke up the brawlers, the younger man and woman backed into a corner as blood appears to stain the back of the 36-year-old’s shirt, the video shows. He pointed at the woman and again accused her of stabbing him — then pulled a handgun out of his jacket pocket.
Stunned commuters ran to the other side of the train. Some knelt on the ground in hope of avoiding bullets.
Somehow, the younger man managed to disarm the older man and shoot him, cops said. The gun, a .380 Ruger, was recovered at the scene.
Cops were still looking Saturday for the woman who stabbed the would be subway shooter.
No charges had been brought yet against the alleged subway gunman as of Saturday.
He is not in police custody in his hospital bed, and investigators are still working on the case, an NYPD spokeswoman said.
If he survives, the parolee could be facing weapons possession charges, a police source with knowledge of the case said.
“He’s just a bad person,” the cabbie said.