Kat’s Woman Problem
Around the time Gov. Hochul’s womanpower event at Barnard got going Thursday, cops arrested Carl Phanor for that morning’s pre-dawn rape of a woman jogging in Hudson River Park. The victim, per prosecutors, “remains in the ICU receiving treatment for several bone fractures, and she was choked to the point of losing consciousness.” Oh, and she was a tourist.
Authorities say her attacker pulled off her running shoes, workout pants and underwear and raped her before stealing her cellphone, debit card, hotel key card and ID and taking off on a Citi Bike.
And Phanor is a homeless vagrant now charged for two other sexual assaults one in late March and another in early October. He’s said to have 25 more priors, mostly for petit larceny, assault, drug possession and drug dealing.
Police apparently nabbed him after he used stolen credit cards at a Target in Midtown and at the Port Authority, where he tried to buy a bus ticket. DNA evidence reportedly ties him to the March rape and a 2019 aggravated sexual assault in Newark.
Again, at the time of the arrest Hochul was uptown, joining with Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris appealing for the votes of young Barnard students. The powerful women insisted that the crime issue is overblown, and anyway GOP challenger Lee Zeldin has no plan to reverse whatever crime wave might exist.
Zeldin on Friday promptly went to the scene of the crime to reiterate his extensive anti-crime plans. And when hecklers showed, he lectured them on everything the “decarceration” movement has done (with Hochul’s support) to send crime soaring.
We haven’t yet heard the gov blame “the system” for this horrific crime tied to a serial offender, though she does keep talking about how New York remains the safest big city in America — skipping over the fact that, after three decades of growing safety, crime started soaring soon after passage of the criminal-justice “reforms” she enthusiastically supports.
Her “it was the system” excuse is of little comfort to the family of Keaira Bennefield, allegedly murdered by her estranged husband, ex-con Adam Bennefield, outside Buffalo — barely a day after his no-bail release on charges of attacking Keaira.
Hochul, meanwhile, insists “dangerousness” is too arbitrary a standard, though every other state lets judges use it.
Eve Hendricks — mother of Bronx teen Brandon Hendricks, who was shot dead in 2020 — says Hochul’s soft-on-crime crew just doesn’t get it.
“Maybe because it’s not their children that are getting killed,” Hendricks fumed during a pro-police rally in Midtown Manhattan this week.
AMC showrunners presciently set Season 11 of their top fearfest in the Big Apple: “American Horror Story: NYC.” Vote for Zeldin if you want to escape a real-life season 12, 13 and on.