A known gang member was collared for attempting to rape a woman in a Manhattan subway station Wednesday night, cops said.
Lamel Batten, 44, approached the 21-year-old victim on the No. 1 train platform at the 116th St.-Columbia University station with his pants down at around 11:45 p.m., according to police.
Batten pushed the woman against a wall, ripped off her shirt and plunged his face into her breasts, cops said.
The suspect was reportedly in the process of pulling down the victim’s pants when she was able to break free.
The woman darted for the station’s mezzanine where she flagged down police, who cuffed Batten.
Batten has been flagged as an emotionally disturbed person by the NYPD and is a known member of the Nine Trey gang, an East Coast subset of the Bloods, police said.
The suspect served more than a year at the Sing Sing Correctional Facility for drug possession in 2017 and has a whopping 144 prior arrests, with charges including petty lewdness and resisting arrest, according to police and records.
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