NO-BAIL FAIL
Suspect in 3 assaults sent to psych ward for new mayhem hours after being freed
Serial assault suspect Eugene Webb became a two-time winner under New York’s lenient new bail laws at a court hearing Saturday night.
At Webb’s arraignment on his second arrest within a week, a Manhattan Criminal Court judge decided the law that took effect Jan. 1 barred him from ordering Webb to post cash or bond to avoid being jailed while awaiting trial.
Normally, such a decision would have allowed Webb, 26, to walk free. But Judge Michael Gaffey came up with another solution — he ordered Webb to be taken to a hospital.
“Based upon the recent acts and the assaults on people, and based upon the evidence that I see here before me and the aspects, Mr. Webb appears confused and disheveled,” the judge said. “And based upon that, I believe that he may have mental illness and may be a harm to himself, to others.”
The suspect was escorted out of the courtroom by a half-dozen officers. It wasn’t clear what hospital he’d be sent to.
Webb was busted Friday for his hostile panhandling outside a Greenwich Village bank, said police. That bust came just eight hours after he was freed without bail on charges he physically assaulted three Manhattan women.
Webb admitted he was high after smoking synthetic marijuana in between his Friday release and his latest arrest, sources indicated.
After Webb’s bust earlier in the week on the assault charges, a Manhattan judge — citing the state’s controversial new laws expected to eliminate cash bail in about 90% of arrests — ordered Webb’s released without bail despite prosecutors’ pleas that the repeat offender be held on $10,000 cash bail or $30,000 bond.
Webb left the courtroom with an ear-to-ear smile on his face. But he soon run afoul of cops in the Village, just 11⁄2 miles northwest of the courthouse, when he appeared outside the ATM vestibule of a Chase branch and demanded change from customers while blocking their access to the cash dispensers, police said.
“He was acting like a troll master, not letting anyone in unless they gave him something,” said a high-ranking police source. “Some people just stand by a door with a cup. But he wasn’t doing that.”
“He was causing a commotion in front of the bank,” a second law enforcement source said. “Then when the cops arrive, he steps up his game and goes jumping in front of cars in traffic. He’s causing havoc and putting everyone’s lives in danger.”
With cars zipping around them, cops chased Webb and finally nabbed him at Sixth Ave. and W. Third St., the sources said. Cops found a glass pipe in his pocket, and the screaming suspect admitted to smoking the synthetic marijuana K2.
“F—- you guys!” howled Webb, according to sources. “That’s K2, bro!”
Some officers recognized Webb from a nearby attack earlier in the week where he knocked out a woman’s tooth with a punch to her face.
It was only seven blocks away on West Houston St. where Webb allegedly unleashed the first of his two unprovoked Wednesday beatdowns. Hours later, he attacked a second woman at Park Ave. and E. 42nd St. — knocking her to the ground and kicking the helpless victim.
He was arrested after cops found him smoking crack in Greenwich Village. Prosecutors noted that Webb was charged in a similar attack on a woman this past September, then failed to show up for his next court appearance.
After the bank incident, police charged Webb on Saturday with reckless endangerment, obstruction of government administration and drug possession. While Webb awaited his court appearance in a holding cell, he blamed the violent attacks on his drug addiction and worried that his latest criminal escapade would finally land him on Rikers Island, sources said.
“I’m f——d,” he was heard saying, according to law enforcement sources.