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BROOKLYN WEEKLY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2019
Thai food tantrum
Man attacks restaurant worker following tirade
BY ROSE ADAMS
Police busted a man suspected in
a bizarre assault on employees at
a Columbia Street Waterfront District
Thai restaurant on Saturday,
in which he allegedly raved
that workers were staring at him
before going berserk, authorities
confi rmed.
“It was scary,” said Nana
Dirounian, a waitress at the Thai
eatery on the corner of Columbia
and Kane streets.
Dirounian said that she and
three other employees took a
meal break around 4:20 pm, when
a 63-year-old man walked into the
restaurant exhibiting strange behavior.
“He was acting weird, smiling
by himself,” Dirounian said. “He
didn’t even look at the menu.”
The suspect, a Brooklyn
Heights resident, sat down without
ordering and stared at the
employees, shouting “Why are
you staring at me?” when workers
happened to glance at him,
Dirounian claimed.
After a ten-minute standoff,
the man allegedly said, “If you’re
going to f--- with me, I’ll f--- with
you,” and approached the workers,
prompting the only male
employee to stand up. The customer
put his hands around the
worker’s neck, tried to push him
to the ground, and threw objects
throughout the store, breaking
a fl ower pot, according to
Dirounian.
When another worker called
the police, the man promptly
changed his tune and apologized
for his behavior, Dirounian said.
“He said ‘I’m sorry,’ and tried
to take my friend’s hand,” she
said. The workers allegedly told
the repentant attacker to wait for
the police and he complied.
Cops arrived at around 4:45 pm
and cuffed the suspect, charging
him with assault and criminal
mischief, police spokesman Detective
Hubert Reyes confi rmed.
Luckily, the victim, who
Dirounian described as a
“trained Thai boxer,” didn’t suffer
any serious injuries from the
fi ght, but she worries that she
and the other employees could be
in danger if the violent customer
returns.
“If my friend who’s a guy isn’t
there, what do we do?” she asked.
CUFFED: Cops arrested a 63-year-old
Brooklyn Heights resident for attacking
restaurant workers in the Columbia
Street Waterfront District.
Photo by Paul Martinka
Tragedy on the rail
Fatal strike: A Q train hit and killed a man at the Sheepshead Bay station on
Tuesday night. Citizen app
BY ROSE ADAMS
A train struck and killed a man at
the Sheepshead Bay subway station
on Tuesday, according to police.
The operator of a northbound
Q train threw on the emergency
breaks after spotting a man on the
tracks near Sheepshead Bay Road
and E. 15th Street shortly after 8
p.m., but was unable to slow the
train in time and slammed into the
victim, cops said.
Firefi ghters and paramedics
rushed to the scene and pronounced
the man dead at 8:25 p.m.,
according to authorities.
Users on the social crime-reporting
app Citizen claimed the
victim fell onto the tracks, but a
spokeswoman for the Police Department
had no information regarding
how he ended up in harms
way, saying only that investigators
do not suspect criminality.