Rolan Reid, 32, was seen on surveillance video pulling a plastic bottle from the garbage and throwing it at a transgender woman before shoving her
A homeless man is charged with attempted murder as a hate crime after pushing a transgender woman onto the subway tracks, authorities said Saturday.
Rolan Reid, 32, was arrested Thursday at Bellevue Hospital, where he was undergoing a psychiatric evaluation after approaching and assaulting a woman at the Bleecker Street station in Manhattan.
Reid was originally charged with second-degree attempted murder and second- and third-degree assault, though these charged were upgraded to hate crimes, NBC reports.
The victim, a 28-year-old woman referred to as Danny by neighbors from Harlem, was standing on the downtown 6 train platform on Monday the morning of the assault, according to police.
She saw Reid spit into a garbage can, after which the man, who was 'acting erratically' according to the police report, asked her, 'What are you looking at?'
Surveillance video shows Reid rushing to a garbage can and grabbing a plastic bottle, which the victim claimed he threw at her, authorities said.
Reid then pushed the woman into the subway tracks and fled, police said, as other riders helped her back onto the platform. She was taken to Bellevue for treatment for scratches and cuts before being released.
Cops caught up to Reid on Thursday night after spotting him on an uptown 6 platform at Canal Street wearing the same shirt and khakis he was wearing on Monday.
Though Reid originally denied pushing anyone onto the subway, he changed his story and told officers, 'I’m going to throw you guys onto the tracks as well.'
The New York Daily News reports Reid has a long history of dangerous outbursts and erratic behavior, with 28 prior arrests on his sheet.
In February 2014, Reid was arrested with a knife on him, and when police asked why, he replied, 'To stab you,' sources told the Daily News.
He was charged with menacing in 2011 after trying to strike someone with a garbage pail, and in 2009 was arrested for hurling bricks around a homeless shelter in Brooklyn.
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