WOMEN TELL OF ATTACKS
Describe street bashings on TikTok; man arrested
Comedian Sarah Suzuki Harvard says she was on her way to host a Lower East Side show earlier this month when an attacker came from out of the blue and struck her.
“I was thinking about the show, in my own headspace — bam, all of a sudden I was hit in the back of my head,” Harvard, 30, told the Daily News on Wednesday.
She is one of many women who have come forward in recent weeks to share incidents of random sidewalk attacks on TikTok, a disturbing trend that’s putting women New Yorkers on edge.
Accounts given by the victims describe different assailants, but one arrest has been made. A 40-year-old Brooklyn man was busted Wednesday for a recent assault on a woman in Chelsea, police say.
Skiboky Stora is charged with attacking a 23-year-old woman as she walked near W. 16th St. and Seventh Ave. at 10:20 a.m. Monday. According to cops, the woman fell to the ground after Stora struck her, causing injuries to the left side of her face.
After Harvard was assaulted on Delancey St. on March 19, she looked around and caught a glimpse of a man running away.
“I just stood there for a moment,” she recounted. “[It was] like someone just put my brain in a jar and just shook it.”
Harvard went to host the show that night, opting not to seek medical attention.
“I still had a headache, still felt a little dizzy. I have this mentality of, someone said, ‘New York tough,’” said Harvard. “If I’m not bleeding and there’s no lump, then I don’t need to go [to a doctor].”
Harvard said she continued to have headaches along with nausea and muscle stiffness, but what’s plaguing her over a week later are the psychological and emotional side effects.
She has had trouble sleeping and breathing, along with panic attacks. Harvard’s been taking more Ubers and canceled plans with friends in an effort to feel safe.
“I’m kind of p----d. I didn’t do anything wrong, and yet I have to change my whole life,” the comedian said. “This incident took less than three seconds.”
The attacks come as the city and state have sent National Guard troops and extra cops to the subways.
Harvard said that’s not making her feel any safer.
“This happened right outside the subway,” she said. “All they’re doing is catching people hopping the subway.”
On Tuesday, another woman posted a video to TikTok after being assaulted, showing a bruise under her left eye.
“I turned the corner and I was looking down and looking at my phone and texting, and out of nowhere this man just came up and hit me in the face,” Mikayla Toninato recorded herself saying while walking down a Williamsburg, Brooklyn, street.
“I texted my friends, and I said, ‘Hi, I just got hit in the face,’ and then they sent me a TikTok of this other girl in New York who got punched in the face and she was looking at her phone,” she added.
Influencer Halley Kate Mcgookin also posted a video to the social media site on Tuesday, filming herself walking down a street in distress, with a lump on the left side of her forehead. “I was literally just walking and a man came up and punched me in the face,” said the influencer, seemingly in shock. “Oh, my God, it hurts so bad.”
In a different video posted the same day, Mcgookin elaborated on the attack.
“My head was down and I was looking at my phone, just sending an email, but there was so much room on the sidewalk,” she said. “Literally there was nobody around, and this man – I don’t know if he punched me or if he elbowed me, because I passed out.”
According to Forbes, Stora was arrested for the assault on Mcgookin. Stora, unsuccessfully ran for City Council last year before being disqualified.
He has been charged with assaulting or harassing three other people in the same area of Manhattan since September, according to criminal complaints.
He allegedly struck a man in the neck and shoulder on the corner of W. 17th St. and Eighth Ave. on Sept. 20. Just over a month later, on Oct. 26, he allegedly assaulted a woman on W. 17th St., hitting her on the shoulder with his elbow.
Then on Nov. 18 at E. 15th St. and Fifth Ave., Stora was allegedly tearing down posters of kidnapped Israeli hostages when a woman began to photograph him.
“The individual began shouting at her and chasing her down the street,” read a criminal complaint. “The individual followed her approximately 1.5 blocks.”
The woman entered an apartment building to escape Stora, but he allegedly followed her in, shouting, “Die, Jew, die.”