Protect us, cabbies cry
THREE CABBIES say they suffered serious injuries at the hands of passengers over the past 18 months, and Queens prosecutors let their attackers off with little more than a slap on the wrist.
Drivers Mohammad Rahman, Toffazal Bhuiyan and Irfan Hyder say prosecutors with the Queens district attorney’s office merely filed lesser charges against their attackers, closed cases without charges or failed to speak with the victim.
An association of South Asian workers filed a complaint with DA Richard Brown by letter on May 17. “We are concerned that many of these assaults are not taken seriously enough and result in dispositions too favorable to the assailants without any deterring effect,” Misbah Uddin, president of the Alliance of South Asian American Labor wrote to Brown.
The DA’s office never responded, said lawyer Ali Najmi. “For-hire vehicle drivers are being assaulted at increasing and alarming rates. We need the district attorneys of this city to prosecute these crimes more aggressively and take these victims seriously,” he said.
A DA spokeswoman said the office had no record of ever getting the letter.“It was resent today via email and we acknowledge receipt,” she said Monday.
Yellow-cab driver Bhuiyan said he was kicked and stomped by John Psaras and Leonidas Lykourezos on Jan. 27, 2017. “I asked them for an address and they didn’t give me one. I can’t go anywhere without one, they just said to drive,” said Bhuiyan, 45, who used to drive 40 hours a week before the beatdown.
The attack exacerbated a lower back injury Bhuiyan suffered five years ago and kept him out of work for a month. He went months without prosecutors reaching out to him for a followup interview, until Najmi set up a meeting in July 2017.
The men accepted an adjournment in contemplation of dismissal disposition — which gets wiped from their criminal records in six months if they don’t get rearrested — as Bhuiyan (inset left) is still suffering from a back injury. The DA’s rep said “prosecutors spoke to Mr. Bhuiyan before offering the (adjournments) to the defendants.”
Rahman, a green-cab driver, was in a coma for two weeks in April 2017 when attempted fare-beater Jose Gonzales punched him in the head and caused him to hit his head on the sidewalk in East Elmhurst. Gonzales got no jail time for the misdemeanor assault charge, Najmi said.
Uber driver Hyder (inset right) was assaulted by two men in Richmond Hill in January, but only a third man, who threatened to punch him, was arrested. The DA’s rep said the other cases are pending and the office is in touch with Hyder’s attorney.