Transit and labor leadership called for justice Tuesday as the trial of a man accused of brutally beating a subway station cleaner more than a year ago inched forward.
“Attacks on MTA workers have to be charged with the utmost seriousness,” chairman Janno Lieber said at a joint press conference with Transport Workers Union officials outside Bronx Criminal Court. “That means real penalties, that means dealing with recidivism, that means people can’t come back in the system and attack MTA workers again and again.”
MTA brass joined union members in the courtroom Tuesday at a status conference for Alexander Wright, the man accused of ambushing station cleaner Anthony Nelson in August 2022.
Nelson was working at the Pelham Bay Park station on the No. 6 train when cops say he came to the aid of several women Wright was harassing.
Prosecutors say Wright then pounced on Nelson, slamming him to the ground, breaking the transit worker’s collarbone and nose.
“This is someone who was an exemplary worker at the MTA,” Lieber said of Nelson, who stood with the transit boss at the podium. “He was brutally attacked.”
Robert Kelley, vice president of stations for the TWU, joined Nelson and Lieber.
“[Our] message is clear and concise,” the union leader said. “You put your hands on our workers, we’re coming after you, and we’re not going to settle for anything. We want you prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”
Wright’s case has been winding its way through Bronx Criminal Court after a protracted back-and-forth over his mental fitness to stand trial. Prosecutors said Tuesday that the trial is expected to proceed in early May.
Previously MTA officials have sought to ban Wright, whose rap sheet includes at least 13 prior arrests, from the city’s public transit system.
Wright’s status conference on Tuesday comes amid renewed concern over attacks on transit workers after several high-profile incidents, including last month’s slashing of an on-the-job subway conductor in Brooklyn.
Lieber and other transit brass have been involved in at least one meeting with prosecutorial staff from all five boroughs, the first in a planned series of meetings to reduce recidivism, part of Gov. Hochul’s subway safety plan announced last month.
