The vigilante group Guardian Angels will once again patrol the New York City subway system amid rampant crime.
Founder Curtis Sliwa announced Sunday that the 150-member group will travel from train car to train car to conduct welfare checks and alert Metropolitan Transportation Authority police to potential dangers.
“Our job is to check on a homeless person, if he or she is homeless or emotionally disturbed, to see if everything is OK,” he told the New York Post from the Stillwell Avenue/Coney Island station – where was a woman. burned alive last week.
“If we suddenly find ourselves in a situation where an episode happens, which happens often, we have to calm it down,” Sliwa said.
“These homeless and emotionally disturbed people often know the Guardian Angels, so we can have a calming effect,” he explained.
“We can also bring the situation to the attention of the police on the platform,” he continued, claiming that the police only patrol the platforms and not the subways.
‘That’s why we always stick our heads out at the station and always look from north to south.
“If there are police officers, we hold the door open and tell the conductor we need the police here.”
Curtis Sliwa, the founder of the Guardian Angels, announced Sunday that the 150-member group will begin traveling from train car to train car to conduct welfare checks and alert Metropolitan Transportation Authority police to any dangers.
He claimed that crime in the New York City subway system is as bad as it was when he first founded the group in 1979.
He went on to say he didn’t think others would take action after Navy vet Daniel Penny was charged with manslaughter for putting Jordan Neely in a chokehold.
“We train, this is what we do, we know how to do it and we will coordinate it once we get on the train with the conductor,” Sliwa said, adding that they would also ensure that the train runs in a station is stopped. so that the police can respond and try to maintain order.
To achieve his goals, Sliwa says he is focused on growing the group’s ranks.
He noted that after he first formed the group amid rising crime in the Big Apple in 1979, “we went from 13 to 1,000 (members) in a year at the time because the need was there.
“The need is now there again,” Sliwa claimed.
‘We are now back to where we were when I founded the group in the metro in 1979. The circle is complete.
“I’ve never seen it this bad.”
The announcement comes as Guatemalan migrant Sebastian Zapeta-Calil, 33, faces charges for allegedly setting a sleeping woman on fire last week
MTA police were seen walking past the unidentified woman as she burned
The metro system recorded its 10th homicide of the year – double the year before – when Guatemalan migrant Sebastian Zapeta-Calil, 33, allegedly set a sleeping woman on fire last week.
According to NYPD data, the subway system never recorded more than five murders in a single year between 1997 and 2019.
Still, a spokesperson for New York City Mayor Eric Adams mocked Sliwa for what she called his “pointless stunts,” while asserting that the mayor “remains focused on real solutions.”
“Mayor Adams is committed to improving the lives of New Yorkers, which is why he regularly rides the subway to talk directly to everyday travelers about how we can make it safer,” Kayla Mamalek told the Post.
“The mayor sent a thousand police officers a day into the subway, reduced overall and transit crime, and delivered real action — not theater — but he knows there’s more work to be done.”
Sliwa said he hopes the patrols will encourage more citizens to take action when they see potential dangers
In the meantime, Sliwa said the Guardian Angels will begin their patrols at the train station where MTA police walked past the unidentified woman as she burned.
“It’s the perfect place because it reminds people that no one did anything a week ago,” he explained.
“No one intervened, no one pointed at the police and said, ‘This is the man.’ Even the police didn’t do anything.’
Sliwa said he now hopes his group’s presence in the metro will encourage more citizens to take action.
“We’re here to say, ‘You see something, you say something, you have to do something.'”