Serial Stabber Killed Homeless Man In Manhattan, Slashed 2 More: NYPD

NEW YORK CITY — A serial stabber is behind three eerily similar attacks against sleeping homeless men in Manhattan, beginning with a murder last week in a West Village Park, police said.

The July 5 murder unfolded about 3 a.m. when an as-yet-unidentified man stabbed a 34-year-old homeless man — who was sleeping on a bench in the Hudson River Greenway near West and Christopher streets — in the stomach, authorities said.

The homeless man died at Bellevue hospital while NYPD officers searched for the stabber.

Last week, they released surveillance footage of a man wearing an "Innocence Project" sweatshirt riding a Citi Bike and requested the public's help finding him.

But police couldn't find the man before he knifed two more homeless people, authorities said.

The second attack took place July 8 about 10 p.m. when a 59-year-man slept on a bench near Madison Avenue and East 49th Street, police said.

An attacker stabbed him in the stomach, authorities said. Medics rushed him to a New York Presbyterian/ Weill Cornell Medical Center, where he was listed in stable condition, police said.

The third and final attack unfolded early Monday in Stanley Isaacs Playground on the Upper East Side. A 28-year-old man was stabbed in the stomach while he slept about 3:30 a.m., police said.

He was taken to Metropolitan Hospital in stable condition.

People with information about the man seen in surveillance footage are asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), or, for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).

They can also submit their tips by logging onto the CrimeStoppers website at https://crimestoppers.nypdonline.org/ or on Twitter @NYPDTips.