Hijacking And Series Of Stabbings Underscore Metro Safety Crisis

COMPTON, CA — An argument on a Metro bus led to a stabbing in the University Park area Friday the same day another man was charged with attempted murder in the stabbing of a Metro bus driver. The violence underscores the public safety emergency declared by the county this week following the fatal stabbing of a woman on a Metro train in the Universal City area.

Friday's stabbing occurred at the intersection of Adams Boulevard and Figueroa Way around 12:35 p.m, Los Angeles Police Department Officer J. Chavez, told Patch. A suspect was later arrested at Grand Avenue and Adams Boulevard, and the victim was rushed to a nearby hospital by paramedics.

According to a statement from Metro, three people got into an argument aboard the Silver Line bus.

"The operator stopped the bus to allow the arguing passengers to exit," according to a Metro statement. "The argument continued on the sidewalk and resulted in an apparent stabbing."

According to Metro, the bus remained at the scene since other passengers were witnesses.

Broadcast footage at the scene showed the Metro bus pulled over to the side of the road and a large bloodstain on the adjacent sidewalk where investigators closed off the area.

Also on Friday, a Hawthorne man who allegedly stabbed a Metro bus operator in the chest in the unincorporated Willowbrook area was charged Friday with attempted murder.

Darnell Marshon Bray, 30, is set to be arraigned Monday at the Compton courthouse on the charge, which includes allegations that he personally used a knife during the crime and personally inflicted great bodily injury, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.

The Metro bus operator was driving his bus route at about 8:30 p.m. April 13 "when the suspect started yelling at him," according to a statement released by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

"The victim stopped the bus at the intersection of 119th Street and Wilmington Avenue," according to a sheriff's department statement. "The suspect, without provocation, punched the victim in the face, then proceeded to stab the victim. The suspect exited the bus and fled northbound on Wilmington Avenue and out of view."

The Metro bus operator — who was stabbed in the chest — was treated at the hospital for his injuries and released, according to the District Attorney's Office.

In a statement announcing the criminal case, District Attorney George Gascón called the attack on the driver "reprehensible" and said "the trauma endured by the bus' passengers is an appalling act of violence that has no place in our community."

The attack came less than a month after another Metro bus driver was kidnapped in a bus hijacking that ended with the bus slamming into the Downtown Los Angeles Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

See Also: Man Who Kidnapped Bus Driver And Slammed Into Ritz Arrested: LAPD

This week Metro's Board of Directors declared a public safety emergency and agreed to procure safety barriers for bus drivers and taking other steps to enhance safety on the system.

Metro board member and Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger also introduced a motion, co-authored by several of her colleagues, to quickly explore solutions to bolster public safety, prompted by the death of 66-year- old Mirna Soza Arauz, who was stabbed in an apparently unprovoked attack earlier this week.

"Metro riders deserve to be safe on the system, and we will continue to do all that," Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who chairs the Board of Directors, said during Thursday's meeting. "We can keep not only our riders, but also our operators, safe, and I know that as a board, we will step up to this challenge because that's what frankly the people of Los Angeles deserve."

Barger said her motion calls for the agency to secure station gate entrances and exits, analyze data on violent crimes -- including those by reoffenders -- occurring on the system, and speed up pilot solutions at some of the most "challenging" stations. The motion was co-authored by Supervisors Janice Hahn and Hilda Solis, as well as L.A. City Council President Paul Krekorian, Inglewood Mayor James Butts and Glendale City Councilman Ara Najarian.

Among other measures the Board of Directors called for were quickly increasing security cameras, implementing facial recognition technology, and using other technology. The agency may also look into ways of banning problematic individuals from Metro altogether.

"We have received reports highlighting improvements since last year on crime stats and over other key areas," Barger said. "But the reality is that we are fighting a battle with one hand tied behind our back."

At one point, Barger said she didn't feel safe riding Metro by herself.

While there was overall agreement to explore as many options as possible to improve Metro's safety, there was disagreement as to how to best get there.

Supervisor Lindsey Horvath was critical of Metro's policing contracts with the Los Angeles Police Department, Long Beach Police Department and L.A. County Sheriff's Department. She suggested that the agencies have not been forthcoming about how they've improved their approach to deploying their officers across the transit system.

City News Service and Patch Staffer contributed to this report.