Tag: Wai Kuen Kwok

Suspect arrested and charged with murder in Sunday’s NYC subway shoving death

Posted By Jenn

Kevin Darden, 34, was arrested yesterday and charged with murder in the Sunday morning killing of 61-year-old Wai Kuen Kwok.
Kevin Darden, 34, was arrested yesterday and charged with murder in the Sunday morning killing of 61-year-old Wai Kuen Kwok.

A man suspected of pushing 61-year-old Wai Kuen Kwok onto the subway tracks to his death in the Bronx on Sunday has been identified, arrested, and charged with murder. Just hours after a second surveillance footage video of the suspect shot from inside a Bronx area bodega was released to the public, 34-year-old Kevin Darden was arrested near his mother’s home in the Bronx.

Witnesses say a man matching the description of the suspect was seen leaving the 167th street subway station minutes after Kwok’s death to board a Bx35 bus. Police subsequently identified Darden as a person of interest based on his connection to a November 6th shoving incident at the West 4th subway station where another man, also Asian, was pushed to the subway platform; based on the similarities of the crime and the suspects’ physical descriptions, police privately began a search for Darden under suspicion that he might also be responsible for Sunday’s murder.

In the earlier incident, the victim says he was shoved from behind by Darden, who said, “you shouldn’t walk in front of me… I’m warning you.” Prior to Sunday morning, no probable cause existed to arrest Darden for the November 6th incident.

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Sunday’s attack means last 3 victims killed in NYC by being pushed into subway tracks were all Asian American men

Posted By Jenn

Photo credit: James Keivom/NY Daily News.
Photo credit: James Keivom/NY Daily News.

I hate to write a sensationalized headline like this one, but I can’t help but ask: why have the last three incidents in NYC involving strangers pushing their victims into oncoming subway trains also appeared to target middle-aged or elderly Asian American male victims?

On Sunday morning, 61-year-old Wai Kuen Kwok and his wife were getting ready to board the D train in the Bronx at the 167th Street station on their way to Chinatown in Midtown. All of a sudden, Kwok disappeared from view — shoved by a total stranger into the path of an oncoming downtrain train and to his death. There was no theft involved and no verbal exchange between victim and his assailant prior to the attack; instead, police believe that the attack on Kwok was entirely random.

While the New York Times reports 49 deaths in 2014 involving subway trains this year in New York City, Kwok’s murder is the first since 2012 that appears to be a deliberate attack; the rest have been ruled either accidents or suicides. And, I can’t be the only one who has noticed: Kwok is now the third person to be killed by being shoved onto the subway tracks in the last two years, and all have been middle-aged or elderly Asian American men.

What the heck is going on here?

Continue reading “Sunday’s attack means last 3 victims killed in NYC by being pushed into subway tracks were all Asian American men”