Raul Morales, a 51-year-old man who stabbed a Jewish man and an Asian man on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, was charged with a hate crime. New details emerged on Saturday when their shared Amsterdam Avenue apartment was searched and Marx’s writings were found. The New York Post reported that two Qurans, a Jehovah’s Witness Bible and a book on Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara were also found.Morales was convicted late Friday of two counts of second-degree attempted murder as a hate crime; The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office stated that each first-degree assault counts as a hate crime, each second-degree assault as a hate crime, and the attempted first-degree assault as a hate crime.
cjp jantar mantar protest update
one attack after another
On Thursday, Morales first approached a 57-year-old Asian man from behind, yelled “Allahu Akbar” and stabbed him in the back, a prosecutor said in his indictment late Friday, according to the district attorney’s office.Morales then continued walking and encountered a Jewish man wearing a kippah, a head covering, who had just left a synagogue and stabbed him in the chest with a screwdriver, the prosecutor said in court, according to the prosecutor’s office.Police said the first attack occurred near 84th Street and Central Park West. The second incident occurred near 86th Street and Central Park West.Both victims are expected to survive.Language in the criminal complaint says a witness saw Morales chanting “Justice for Islam” near a synagogue on West 83rd Street, according to materials from the district attorney’s office. There is no evidence that the victims or Morales knew each other.Morales’ roommate said he told her he was just going for a walk in the park. Morales did not appear angry or agitated. Neighbors also confirmed that in their casual conversations Morales did not come across as a violent person.Morales apparently worked as a security guard in Brooklyn at least around 2007; In the early 1990s he spent two years in state prison on drug charges and nearly a decade on probation,