A 48-year-old man has been arrested after being seen on video punching a 55-year-old Asian woman in New York City’s Chinatown.
The incident occurred on Monday night, with graphic footage of the attack receiving attention on social media after being shared by Yuh-Line Niou, a member of the New York State Assembly for the 65th district. In the video, the woman is seen being punched in the face before falling to the ground.
“This was just sent to me from my constituent,” Niou said on Monday when sharing the footage. “This just happened in my district in Chinatown. He has been arrested and our precinct is investigating.”
Later, Niou added that the victim was “conscious and cognizant and alert” after receiving treatment.
According to a regional CBS report, 48-year-old Alexander Wright has been arrested and charged with assault as a hate crime, as well as additional counts. The suspect is believed to have resided in a local homeless shelter. As noted in a separate report from NBC News, he was arrested one block away from the location of the attack and was taken to a nearby hospital for a psychological evaluation.
Earlier this month, Stop AAPI Hate—a nonprofit organization—shared new data showing that reports of anti-Asian hate incidents nearly doubled in March. Types of discrimination mentioned in the national report include verbal harassment, physical assault, civil rights violations, and online harassment. Hate incidents reported by women accounted for 64.8 percent of all reports.
In a subsequent report from Stop AAPI Hate that was put together in collaboration with the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum, Asian American and Pacific Islander women were shown to be twice as likely to report experiencing a targeted hate incident than men.
