A woman waiting for her flight at Newark Liberty International Airport was stabbed by a man who’d just been freed from jail days earlier, police said.
Xiong Jin is facing charges of aggravated assault and unlawful possession of a weapon in connection with the seemingly random attack on Melissa Mauldin. She told WABC it unfolded quickly on Sunday while she was in the departures level of the airport’s Terminal A, where she’d been watching a little boy play before her assailant grabbed her from behind.
“I felt the force from his fist, and the blade was so short,” 36-year-old Mauldin said in an interview released on Tuesday.
Despite the size of the knife, the attacker managed to do some serious damage. Mauldin, who lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, was rushed to hospital, albeit with non-life threatening injuries. She needed 14 stitches and both her nose and cheekbone were fractured.
Mauldin said she’d been in the area for a friend’s wedding in Hoboken. She was on her way home when she was attacked, she added.
Port Authority officers already on the scene immediately subdued Jin, and he was taken into custody. Police said he was freed from jail just two days before the attack, adding that he’s been in and out of prison since 2009 for various assault charges.
“He wasn’t there for a flight, he had no bags, he had nothing,” Mauldin told WABC. “He was just there with the intent to hurt somebody.”
She added: “Why are you that evil? He stabbed multiple people before.”
At the time of publication it was unclear whether the attack occurred past security checkpoints. The Daily News has reached out to the Port Authority for clarification.
