Cops track down train perv susps
THE CLUELESS son of Fox News correspondent Geraldo Rivera cracked a joke while leaving court Wednesday after an arrest for nearly choking his girlfriend unconscious.
“I hope I look good, guys,” 30-year-old Cruz Rivera said to a pair of Daily News photographers after his release without bail at a Manhattan arraignment.
The cocky Rivera was busted for attacking Meghan Burke when she broke off their turbulent nine-year relationship, according to authorities and the victim’s mom.
“He’s insane, he’s a sociopath, he’s a real manipulator,” Burke’s mother said after Rivera’s arrest. “Ever since she met him, we have tried hard to counsel her against him. He’s not a good guy.”
Though Rivera faces a halfdozen charges, he had reason to celebrate after the hearing: Prosecutors revealed that Burke said she didn’t want to testify in the case.
According to a defense attorney, Burke called Rivera on Thursday to say she was sorry and still loved him.
Burke, who began dating Rivera in 2009, visited his Washington Heights apartment on Tuesday evening to retrieve some of her personal items after their acrimonious split, police sources said.
Rivera instead threw Burke down on his bed, wrapped both hands around her throat and began biting her right hand and right leg, according to police sources.
His roommate dialed 911 once the choking commenced, and a neighbor described a loud argument followed by a woman screaming.
“I heard her say something about a bed and then ‘Stop!’ ” said a neighbor who lives upstairs. “Then I just heard rumbling . . . (She) kept saying ‘Stop!’ And then it calmed down.”
A criminal complaint charges Rivera wrapped his arm around Burke’s neck and squeezed until she “experience(d) trouble breathing and to feel like she was losing consciousness.”
Rivera finally shoved the disoriented Burke to the ground, according to the complaint.
He is charged with assault, criminal obstruction of breathing, aggravated harassment, attempted assault and harassment.
The suspect does not have a criminal record, said defense attorney Arthur Aidala.
“The actions Cruz is accused of committing are not consistent with the young man the Rivera family loves and supports,” the lawyer said.
But Burke’s mother insisted that Rivera had a history of bad behavior when it came to her 26-year-old daughter.
She said her daughter met Rivera in 2009, when she was a freshman at SUNY Maritime College in the Bronx.
Burke described a troubled relationship, with her Staten Island daughter staying despite Rivera having three kids with another woman — all born while he was dating Burke.
“The fact that she has been brought down by this piece of garbage — it’s incomprehensible,” the mom said. POLICE PINCHED a pair of pervs — including a psychiatric patient — wanted for pleasuring themselves on Manhattan subways, said Wednesday.
Dennis Patrick, 59, was busted Tuesday — nearly six months after police released a photo of him picking his nose on a train.
Patrick, who lists the Manhattan Psychiatric Center on E. 125th St. as his address, allegedly masturbated in front of a 34-yearold woman on a Queens-bound E train at the 53rd St. station in Midtown on Sept. 29.
He struck again on Oct. 11, on a Brooklyn-bound A train at the 14th St. station in the West Village, fondling himself in front of a 32-year-old man, cops said.
Juan Funes, 31, was arrested on Wednesday for masturbating in front of a 33-year-old woman on an uptown 1 train at Chambers St. Jan. 26.
The woman snapped a photo of him, which police released to days later. He surrendered with his lawyer, cops said.
Both men face public lewdness charges.