A masked man reportedly attempted to abduct a six-year-old Hasidic boy in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights on Saturday afternoon, grabbing the child as he walked with his father.
The incident, which occurred around 3:30 p.m., was captured on video and shows the man in a blue and white letterman jacket approaching the family and reaching for the boy.
The father swiftly intervened, pulling his son from the man’s grasp and striking him, after which the attacker fled on foot. No injuries were reported, and the NYPD’s 71st Precinct is investigating, with no arrests made yet.
Shomrim, a volunteer safety patrol for New York’s Jewish community, noted that the assailant did not speak during the encounter. The motive remains unclear, though community spokesperson Yaacov Behrman expressed concern over a series of recent incidents in the area.
“This video is shocking,” he wrote on X. “Something is clearly going on in Crown Heights—there have been incident after incident over the past two weeks,” he added.
Crown Heights, a center for New York’s Orthodox Jewish community, has seen past attacks, including the stabbing of Yechiel Dabrowskin in August. The investigation remains ongoing, with authorities urging vigilance in the neighborhood.
