New York Post

SLAY VIC STOLE MY SNEAKERS

Video killer at Rikers: I hear voices

- By ROSS TOBACK Additional reporting by Bruce Golding

A Brooklyn man who fatally knifed a guy in a bloody attack caught on cam-mera says he did it because the victimm stole his Air Jordan sneakers.

In an interview with The Post onn Rikers Island, Ernest Dubinsky said he was hearing “voices in my head” andd had been off his meds for two yearsrs before stabbing Lekaurius Thomasas outside a Brighton Beach bodega onn Thursday.

“He stole a bag of my clothes thehe night before. Air Jordans, 10 shirts,s, shorts, socks, underwear,” Dubinskyky said of Thomas, who was munchingng on a bagel when he was stabbed.

“The voices told me to hurt but notot to kill him.”

Dubinsky knifed Thomas in front of the B&B Mini Market at Neptune Ave-ve nue and Brighton Fourth Street around 6:20 a.m., authoritie­s said.

Dubinsky called 911 moments later, waited to get busted and confessed to the stabbing, law-enforcemen­t sources have said.

Shocking surveillan­ce video shows Thomas, 31, sitting on a milk crate as Dubinksy, 36, approaches, opens a folding knife and sticks it in Thomas’ torso.

Dubinsky then chases the mortally wounded Thomas across the street until the victim collapses in front of a taxi.

During his jailhouse interview, Dubinsky — a Ukrainian immigrant whose shoulders are tattooed with eight-pointed stars typically inked in Russian prisons to identify thieves — said he had worked in constructi­on until he was sidelined by a finger injury.

Dubinsky said he stopped taking his medication — including the antipsycho­tic drug Haldol — when he became homeless and could no longer afford it.

“I’m on the meds now, and I’m feeling better. No voices in my head,” he said.

Dubinsky said that he and Thomas “were friends” who “used to get high together” but that he had been told that Thomas stole his clothing a day earlier.

“I went up to him and asked for my clothes back . . . and he said, ‘Get out of my face, p- - -y,’ ” he said.

“It went all black after that. I don’t remember anything. I don’t remember calling 911 or anything.”

Dubinsky also said he had spent the night before the slaying in a homeless shelter.

A spokesman for the city Department of Homeless Services said confidenti­ality rules barred the agency from confirming that claim.

Before Thomas’ killing, Dubinsky had been busted 21 times on charges involving menacing, grand larceny and drugs, sources have said, and court records show he had four open cases in Brooklyn Criminal Court.

He’s being held without bail on charges of second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon.

 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States