Woman Assaulted In Tribeca Bias Attack Speaks Out

TRIBECA, NY — A Tribeca lawyer who was bashed in the face on her way to work admired her attacker for what she thought was dancing moments before she was struck in the head with a metal make-up box, she told the Daily News.

“I was walking down the block and I did see this woman take her arm and swing it all the way back," the 57-year-old victim, who asked that her identity not be revealed for fear of reprisal, told the newspaper. “In my head I thought she was dancing, and to myself I said, 'Isn't that nice, a woman is dancing on the street'. And the next thing you know, kapow! Right in the eye, cheek — I mean, the pain was excruciating."

The woman, a lawyer who works on civil rights, juvenile justice and immigration issues, was clobbered on May 31at 11:50 a.m. on Warren Street near West Broadway, police said Friday. She was on her way back to her office when her attacker struck, she told The News.

“I was shocked. She stood there. She looked at me and she said, ‘White bitch, take that!’ And she laughed," the victim said.

Stunned from the attack, the woman asked strangers on the street to survey her injuries and check that she had all her teeth before she eventually was checked by a doctor at at NYU Langone Medical Center.

"I looked gruesome. I had a black eye, totally closed, the whole side of my face was purple, and my nose, even though it wasn’t broken, it was skewed to the side because of how swollen my face was," she told the tabloid.

The victim said she saw the woman shove a man before she was assaulted and patrons at a nearby bar told her that they saw her attacker hit another person before continuing her rampage. Yet the Tribeca lawyer still managers compassion for her assailant.

“I feel like she really needs help, because I don’t want her to do it to anybody else,” the woman told The News. “And she herself can get herself into a situation, you know. What if she hits someone and kills them? Hitting someone in the head is not a joke."

Despite her injuries, the victim went ahead with plans to compete in an ice skating competition the following day at Chelsea Piers, an annual event she has skated in for 30 years.

That afternoon the woman won six gold medals.

“I just felt like love should win out over hate," she said. "I felt like I couldn't not appear.”

Photo courtesy of NYPD