Image courtesy Metropolitan Transit Authority

A Pace University student was stabbed in the head by a NYC subway beggar on Monday after the student refused to provide a ‘charitable donation’ to the bum’s booze fund. The attacker is in custody and the student is expected to survive. This attack is atypical, because it didn’t happen in a back alley or seedy drug den, and it didn’t even happen in the middle of the night. Police say the violent mugging started out as some run-of-the-mill mid-afternoon panhandling, but the 42 year-old beggar turned violent when the 19 year-old student refused to give him money . . .

The bum jumped the kid and stabbed him in the head before wandering away. Police caught him soon after, and he’s in Ryker’s Island awaiting charges.

Any time an innocent, law-abiding person is viciously attacked on the street by a stranger, it should result in a DGU. At best the attacker will run like hell with no shots fired. At worst, the attacker will assume ambient temperature. Either way, the offender’s proclivity toward violent recidivism will be reduced.

This case should have been a DGU also, but for two incomprehensible laws. The first is peculiar to NYC, where the ‘little people’ (you and I) are prohibited from carrying concealed firearms for self-defense. Senators, city aldermen, real-estate moguls and movie stars can call in some favors and get a CCW permit, but there’s one rule for them and another rule for the rest of us. This needs to change in NYC, just like it has had to change in Chicago.

The second incomprehensible rule affects all of us:  the law that bars anyone under the age of 21 from possessing a handgun. I’ve never seen any logic in this. It’s not that nineteen year-olds can’t be trusted. In some jurisdictions you don’t even need to be 21 years old to be a gun-carrying police officer.

18 to 21 year-olds are trusted with all kinds of things: we trust them with the vote, with driving and paying their taxes, with property ownership, with marriage and child-rearing, with jury service and military service.

But in nanny-state ‘We Know What’s Best For You’ America, some have decided that we don’t trust them with handguns. The real problem is not that the nannies don’t trust them with guns; it’s that they’re afraid to trust any of us with guns. It’s just easier to single out the nineteen year-olds first.

Our advice to the unnamed 19 year-old student who’s expected to survive? GTFO from NYC, and as soon as you’re 21 get yourself trained up and tooled up.

Source: NY Daily News.

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50 COMMENTS

  1. They also do not allow you to carry a knife with a clip. (clips onto your pocket, belt, etc.)

    • Do you have a handle on the NYC pocket knife laws? Can you, or anyone, bullet point this out with small words?

      I more or less understand NYS laws (at least until Proconsul Cuomo the Younger gets around to “fixing” those too). I think I understand my city’s local variations. NYC’s pocket knife “laws” are opaque to me after three tries at locating and understanding them.

      • Jim, From all I am hearing out of NYC they consider a folding type knife clipped in your pocket as a gravity knife. They are citing people for it.
        NYC Code on Knives below http://72.0.151.116/nycnew/index.html

        New York City Administrative Code –

        Title 10
        Public Safety

         § 10–133 Possession of knives or instruments. a. Legislative findings. It is hereby declared and found that the possession in public places, streets and parks of the city, of large knives is a menace to the public health, peace, safety and welfare of the people of the city; that the possession in public places, streets and parks of such knives has resulted in the commission of many homicides, robberies, maimings and assaults of and upon the people of the city; that this condition encourages and fosters the commission of crimes, and contributes to juvenile delinquency, youth crime and gangsterism; that unless the possession or carrying in public places, streets and parks of the city of such knives without a lawful purpose is prohibited, there is danger of an increase in crimes of violence and other conditions detrimental to public peace, safety and welfare. It is further declared and found that the wearing or carrying of knives in open view in public places while such knives are not being used for a lawful purpose is unnecessary and threatening to the public and should be prohibited.
         b. It shall be unlawful for any person to carry on his or her person or have in such person’s possession, in any public place, street, or park any knife which has a blade length of four inches or more.
         c. It shall be unlawful for any person in a public place, street or park, to wear outside of his or her clothing or carry in open view any knife with an exposed or unexposed blade unless such person is actually using such knife for a lawful purpose as set forth in subdivision d of this section.
         d. The provisions of subdivisions b and c of this section shall not apply to (1) persons in the military service of the state of New York when duly authorized to carry or display knives pursuant to regulations issued by the chief of staff to the governor; (2) police officers and peace officers as defined in the criminal procedure law; (3) participants in special events when authorized by the police commissioner; (4) persons in the military or other service of the United States, in pursuit of official duty authorized by federal law; (5) emergency medical technicians or voluntary or paid ambulance drivers while engaged in the performance of their duties; or (6) any person displaying or in possession of a knife otherwise in violation of this section when such knife (a) is being used for or transported immediately to or from a place where it is used for hunting, fishing, camping, hiking, picnicking or any employment, trade or occupation customarily requiring the use of such knife; or (b) is displayed or carried by a member of a theatrical group, drill team, military or para-military unit or veterans organization, to, from, or during a meeting, parade or other performance or practice for such event, which customarily requires the carrying of such knife; or (c) is being transported directly to or from a place of purchase, sharpening or repair, packaged in such a manner as not to allow easy access to such knife while it is transported; or (d) is displayed or carried by a duly enrolled member of the Boy or Girl Scouts of America or a similar organization or society and such display or possession is necessary to participate in the activities of such organization or society.
         e. Violation of this section shall be an offense punishable by a fine of not more than three hundred dollars or by imprisonment not exceeding fifteen days or by both such fine and imprisonment.

        • Possession of a knife “encourages and fosters the commission of crimes”. I believe their premise is false.

          Just how does possession of a knife with a 4 1/4″ long blade encourage crime?

        • Sheesh. The criminal act does not stem from the item used. The carrying of a weapon used in a crime stems froma criminal disposition.

        • The pocket clip falls under that first subsection “c” I think: “…to wear outside of his or her clothing or carry in open view any knife with an exposed or unexposed blade…”

          The pocket clip is considered to make the knife visible. If you have to get out of the car in NYC, just drop it down in your pocket or have a shirt that readily covers it.

          I did some reading on it when I was big into knives, not so much into the law itself but how it was enforced in practice and that is what I had come up with. So: grain of salt, etc…

        • Marcus – That’s not what the law says, I quoted from it. It says anyone possessing a knife is a menace to society just by possessing it. Even without intending to harm someone with it.

        • The supposed “reasoning” behind passing this legislation to make the carry of knives illegal in New York City would be entirely moot if they had not already made it illegal for law abiding citizens to carry a pistol for self defense. They created this problem themselves by enacting an unconstitutional law against keeping and bearing arms in the form of pistols, then double down by passing another law making it illegal to keep and bear arms in the form of knives.

          Are the people who write these laws natural born idiots or do they have to take classes on this stuff?

        • I’m an NYC resident who carries a legal knife in my pocket every day. I scrupulously researched the laws as to what is permissible. Of course, don’t trust me and read the penal code and do hours of research on what the cops actually enforce. If you just read the penal code you’ll think “gravity knives” means gravity knives. Ha! Bottom line: the only pocketknives a normal citizen can legally carry in New York City are fixed-blades and Opinels with a blade length under 4″, carried completely concealed. Nothing must be visible, including a clip or sheath. Don’t get too close to 4″ (3.75″ would be better), measure not just the length of the edge but the greatest distance from the tip of the knife to the handle. You want to leave a little lee-way and not make it 3.99″ so that it’s easy for the cops to measure and harder for them to make a mistake. Single-edged blades only. Any knife for which it is physically possible to be opened by force of inertia, even by gripping the blade instead of the handle, is considered a gravity knife and forbidden. Any knife that can be opened one-handed is forbidden. Opinels are hard enough to open (two hands, twist the lock, impossible to open with inertia) that they’re OK, the only folding knife I’m sure is NYC legal. Also a good blade shape and not intimidating-looking. An Opinel #10 is, if I remember correctly, about 3 7/8″, but I stopped carrying an Opinel because I realized that if I needed to deploy the knife defensively by the time I opened it would probably be too late. I carry a Cold Steel Mini-Tac Kiridashi. Intimidating looking shape, but not too intimidating so as to make me look like a troublemaker, that’s good for defensive use (not ideal for cutting apples, though). The Mini-Tac series has the best small handle I’ve ever seen on a knife. With the sub-hilt, it really locks into the hand. Clips are OK, but you CANNOT clip a knife to your pants. If ANY part of the knife is visible, including the clip or sheath, it’s a crime. They can see my pen and flashlight clips, but I hide my knife totally concealed.

      • Thank you, all. That was infuriating overwhelming informative.

        I was stuck on the gravity knife / not a gravity knife, and visible / not visible distinctions. I’m getting that both of these distinctions depend on the most convoluted interpretation that can be made by people who want to ding you, regardless.

        Net, make your choices so you don’t give them the opportunity.

  2. The entire culture of city dwellers is 180° from common sense and reason, as practiced by humanity occasionally for the past few millennia.

    The city logic regarding guns? ” Our violent metropolis would be MOGADISHU if we didn’t deny the right to keep and bear arms!”

    As repugnant as this sounds, the city dwellers fully believe that a dead victim of a criminal attack is simply the utilitarianist price paid for an overall safe society.

    Those of you whove spend your entire lives in Pro-Rights America, please be greatful every day for it.City life in Blue America really is like living in a foreign country.

    • Interesting… never thought of it this way before, but it’s like the rank-and-file citizens of NYC (not the uber-citizens, of course) are like a huge herd of wildebeests. Facing predation from all sides, the herd believes there is safety in numbers because the lions or crocodiles cannot get them all. Which is a true statement. Unfortunately, the herd itself may attract increased predation upon its members.

      I’ve worked in and traveled off and on to NYC for decades. I like visiting NYC, though I could never live there. New Yorkers view acts like those in the subway as simply the cost of living there. A violence tax to which the only response is to just give them whatever they want and live for another day (hopefully). A completely foreign philosophy to some one who grew up in TX. Hmmm… New Yorkers and the herd mentality…

      I need to stop watching so much NatGeo and get out of my house more.

      • City dwellers will tell you that while driving in bad parts of the city “Lock your doors and DO NOT get out of your vehicle.” This has led to coining the phrase: “The Safari Principle”. If you get out of your vehicle a lion will kill you and you got what you deserved for your stupidity. All very acceptable to city dwellers.

      • You’re precisely right, 505. You have just stumbled onto the frame of mind of a collectivist. Safety in numbers, at the expense of the individual.

      • That’s actually a good summary of how it works. It’s a herd mentality. (Which helps explain why “diversity” for these people is all about ideological sameness.)

        I’m not sure about some of his conclusions, but Anonymous Conservative has a pretty brilliant take on this. http://www.anonymousconservative.com/blog/the-theory/rk-selection-theory/. Check out his “Touching the Raw Amygdala” series on how to destroy the typical liberal in a debate. It’s brilliant.

      • The flaw in this theory, for the urban dwellers, is that lions and crocodiles do not carry knives or pistols. The predators in the cities do. The other problem is that lions and crocodiles only kill when they are hungry. Punks and thugs in the cities kill for drugs, or turf, or because you are the wrong color (or wearing the wrong color), or sometimes just for the Hell of it.

        I also think they resemble a “bait ball” more than a herd. JMHO

        • Expand beyond the box of “food” and think in terms of killing for resources in a more general sense.

          Also, animals do kill for reasons other than food.

    • That was a brilliant statement. Before, I could never understand why “they” thought the way they do about denying the RKBA. Saying they already think of their utopia as an already violent place and allowing guns in it would make it a billion times worse (from their logic) makes sense now to me. Now I know where they are coming from. That the violence from criminals is an acceptable “tax” to keep the violence from occurring that they think would occur if everybody had guns. Wrong, but at least I know why they think that.

    • I think there is a lot Progressive lowest common denominator thinking going on as well. Progressive radical egalitarianism requires everybody to face the same risks. Everybody except the Nomenklatura that is. Since not all people will choose to exercise their right to bear arms it is unfair that part of the population that does will be safer than those who don’t.

    • Both you and 505markf have said it perfectly as sad as it is. In ancient time someone had to become a sacrifice to the (insert name) god for protection. It was never the leaders or their families however odd that may be, hmm. These are the descendants of the sacrificial lambs who would rather go and take the abuse from an attacker rather than fight back. I thank God I do not have to live like that. I don’t know if it is genetic or what, but all civilizations have to rely on them to be willingly ruled over.

  3. “At WORST the attacker will run like hell with no shots fired. At BEST, the attacker will assume ambient temperature.”

    There. Fixed it for you.

  7. This does need to change. There are too many stories like this where innocent people are stabbed by some homeless panhandler. I take the train my ride is usually 30-40 min & during off peak hours – no rush hour I’ve seen 3-5 panhandlers. Its a bet this Pace University student won’t bounce because if he got stabbed in/and from Queens he’s prob mid – low income, low info voter & PU is a pretty liberal school & I bet all his friends are liberal minded. I could be wrong. Hope he does heal both from this & from his liberal mindset.

    • I agree it needs to change but believing in the right to self-defense and holding a liberal political outlook aren’t mutually exclusive. There’s nothing innately “liberal” about a unilateral gun ban.

      Anyway, I used to work a really early shift that had me taking the subway from Queens to Manhattan at 2am. The E train was like a mobile homeless shelter overnight. I learned a tactic that worked for me when dealing with panhandlers where I would just say “Sorry, brother” when someone asked for money. I think addressing someone with some kind of affinal terminology helps to offset the rejection. With that said, our health system is terrible at dealing with the mentally ill and that won’t change until we prioritize proper health care for everyone.

  8. Reminds me of happen in my town last year. A Professor got stabbed and later died from a homeless person who was mentally off. Unfortunately it’s a big problem here where you have mentally ill people roaming around and not getting treated. Thank God our laws are not like NYC. That kid definitely needs to get the F@#! out of dodge and strap up!

  9. The panhandlers ok? Nothing to see here folks, just another sunny day in liberal utopia, Randy

  10. There are maybe 50,000 licensed handgun owners in New York City which has a population of well over eight million people. A permit that is valid in any New York county outside of New York City is NOT valid within the city, i.e. you need a second NYC permit to even possess a handgun within the city limits. As long as the crime statistics in Manhattan are going down we will never see any change. The outer boroughs where more of the lower income families (read brown peoples) reside are seeing increased crime, but as long as the tourist and wealthy sections are fine the city government isn’t going to change a thing.

    • Which basically means that unless you actually live in NYC, it is illegal for you to possess a firearm, even if you are just passing through. Just how does this pass equal protection analysis?

  13. To assume the attacker would run or end up cold is false. There is a chance that the 19 year old may not have been able to stop the attack or may have lost his firearm during the attack. However the real crime is to deny the 19 year old the opportunity of armed self defense.

    • There is also that small chance that you give the bad guy one good shot right through the heart and in their last ten seconds you still get your carotid severed.

    • These comments could go on for another 100 entries or so if we just ask folks to list the ways this could go wrong even if he was armed. Starting with an over-zealous anti-2A prosecutor destroying his life and his parents’ bank accounts.

      The basic point remains – if law abiding citizens cannot have guns for self protection ONLY criminals will have guns with which to assault them, AND they will have no dis-incentive to those assaults other than the random chance of NYPD being in the neighborhood.

      As has been proven over and over again in places where our natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms has been upheld, criminals, even the crazy panhandlers, stop assaulting people at random.

      Statistically 2 million+ times each year a violent crime is prevented by a citizen with a gun. This would probably double if urban centers like NYC, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles, were forced to adhere to the Second Amendment RKBA.

      • Of equal importance (in my mind): If law abiding citizens cannot have guns for self protection, then criminals no longer need guns to victimize citizens. I would not want to go toe-to-toe with someone who just finished a six month sentence of weight lifting and who’s hobbies include recidivism.

        Plus this argument nullifies claims that eventually criminals CAN be disarmed.

  14. In some parts of society we give 19 year olds select fire rifles, machine guns and even 120mm cannon.

    • Or let me’ drive a fucking nuclear sub! But booze on shore leave? Nope. The ability to protect their family like we expect them to protect ours? Nope.

  15. I wish residents of NYC and Cali would make up their minds; are they “Republicans” who love guns and hate gays/unions/taxes/etc., or are they “Democrats” who love all that and hate guns. It would make it a lot easier if they could figure it out.

    • Philip, your “either/or” characterization of Republicans and Democrats is specious.

      Not all Republicans, or conservatives, by default or be requirement of affiliation, hate “gays” (homosexuals). Nor do all Republicans automatically support the Second Amendment.

      I do not willingly fraternize with Democrats or Liberals as a general rule, but I would be willing to bet that a huge percentage of the rank and file, polled honestly, do not know or understand the Progressive political agenda and most definitely love their guns and hate homosexuals (except bi-sexual women).

      I challenge you to provide one legitimate report of a group of Republican/conservative young men who have engaged in a “gay-bashing” incident.

  16. The sad part is that the mayor and city council of NYC were actually elected by the voters of that jurisdiction. A majority of those people are as deluded about un-Constitutional firearms laws, regulations, and policies as Neville Chamberlain was about Hitler. The only thing that penetrates the Alice in Wonderland veneer of unreality that surrounds them are the lethal weapons of criminals. Even then, many of them would still rather be defenseless drones in a mindless hive than accept the fact that we are all responsible for our own self defense.

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