Hospital Greeter Linked To NYC Serial Stabbings By Work Lanyard: NYPD

NEW YORK CITY — A lanyard worn by a serial stabber who left at least six people wounded in a bloody nine-day spree across New York City led cops to a hospital greeter, police said.

Jermain Rigueur, 27, was arrested Wednesday in Queens, just hours after NYPD officials pleaded for the public's help tracking down a serial stabber.

"It didn't appear as though he was looking to stop anytime soon," Mayor Eric Adams said.

Rigueur, who faces a bevy of charges including attempted murder, worked as a greeter at Woodhull Hospital in Bed-Stuy, the New York Daily News first reported.

A lanyard seen on the stabber's neck in a surveillance video turned out to be an ID from the hospital, police said.

When police eventually linked Rigueur to the crimes, they found him wearing the same clothing and sneakers as the suspect, said NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny.

"He was also wearing that distinctive lanyard around his neck," he said.

The stabbing spree left five men and one woman — mostly in Queens — wounded, police said.

Many attacks carried eerie similarities, with victims recounting feeling as if they were punched from behind, only to discover they were knifed, police said. The stabber laughed in one victim's face and otherwise was heard muttering to himself, authorities said.

The attacks culminated Wednesday in a trio of stabbings in the span of an hour, authorities said.

One further attack — a Wednesday morning stabbing on a J train in Williamsburg — appears part of the spree, police officials said.

Rigueur was pacing back and forth on a J train approaching the Flushing Avenue station, said Kenny.

He stood over a stranger and as the doors opened at Flushing, Rigueur "plunged a knife into his victims' chest" and left the train, Kenny said.

Police said the Brooklyn stabbing seems like a random attack by Rigueur, not a specifically targeted assault.

Rigueur has worked for Woodhull Hospital since mid-November, before which he had cleared a background check, according to Dr. Mitchell Katz, CEO and President of NYC Health + Hospitals.

Given the hospital's zero-tolerance policy towards violence, Rigueur has been placed on administrative leave, Katz said.

Rigueur faces three counts of attempted murder, four counts of assault, one of attempted assault and four counts of criminal possession of a weapon, police said.

Patch writer Emily Rahhal contributed to this report.