BY BEN BRACHFELD
The Bishop of Brooklyn
on Tuesday honored a heroic
straphanger who saved a
woman from being stabbed on
a subway platform in May.
Sean Conaboy, 52, a Flatbush
native who has lived in Sunset
Park for 16 years, was hailed
as a hero and given a medal by
Brooklyn Bishop Nicholas Di-
Marzio in a ceremony at the
headquarters of the Brooklyn
Diocese in Windsor Terrace.
“You gave help to someone
in trouble, did not concern
about your own safety,”
DiMarzio told Conaboy, who
said he had never met Bishop
DiMarzio, or any other bishop,
before. “We really tip our hat
to you and thank you.”
Conaboy, a freelance cameraman
for the Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation, was
waiting for a Brooklyn-bound F
train at the Union Square stop
at night on May 19 — the F train
was rerouted along Broadway
that night, he said — when a
man, identifi ed as 22-year-old
Joshua Nazario, began repeatedly
COURIER L 10 IFE, JULY 23-29, 2021
stabbing 54-year-old Kelli
Daley nearby on the platform.
Surveillance video showed
Conaboy hastily springing
into action, tackling and, with
some assistance from other
straphangers, disarming the
assailant at great risk to his
own safety before cops could
arrive, despite being exhausted
from a 12-hour workday.
“Some angel or saint had
been watching over me for
sure,” Conaboy told reporters.
“Because I really, at one point
or another, thought that my
whole back is exposed, I have
no ability to see anything but
tunnel vision, and I could be
grievously injured myself. I
was fortunate that I wasn’t.”
Cops charged Nazario,
of the Bronx, with felony assault
and criminal possession
Subway hero Sean Conaboy, center, receives a medal from Brooklyn Bishop Nick DiMarzio, right. On the left is
Paterson, NJ Bishop Kevin Sweeney, Conaboy’s former pastor. Photo by Ben Brachfeld
of a weapon. Daley was taken
to Bellevue Hospital, and survived
her injuries. Conaboy
said that Daley, who works in
politics, has now returned to
her job and is in recovery from
the incident, and that they
have spoken on a number of occasions
since that fateful day.
“Kelli and I have struck up
a bit of a friendship through
this, which is, I guess, a blessing,”
Conaboy said. “And I
hope it continues. She’s dealing
with it the best she can.”
Conaboy is a devout Catholic,
and has been attending
St. Michael’s Catholic Church
in Sunset Park since 2006, he
said. His former pastor at St.
Michael’s, Kevin Sweeney,
now the Bishop of Paterson,
New Jersey, said that he
wasn’t surprised to learn Conaboy
had stopped the stabber,
having known him as a person
of deep faith.
Conaboy said he was able to
be on alert and take action the
way he did because he wasn’t
looking at his phone or listening
to music, and said people
should stay alert to potential
dangers on the subway.
“If there’s any lesson I can
teach people, it’s stay alert,”
Conaboy said. “It’s not the
Roosevelt Field shopping
mall, it’s the subway, and it’s
dangerous.”
He also wanted people to
understand that while he may
have been a hero in the situation,
there was still a victim.
“As honored as I am to be
here, there is a victim in all of
this and it isn’t me,” Conaboy
said. “Kelli is somebody who
will have to fi nd her way forward
in her life. To heal, emotionally
if not physically. It is
my sincere hope that she does
and I think she deserves our
prayers.”
Heroic straphanger
honored by
Brooklyn Diocese
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