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Maniac arrested in NYC subway slashings, NYPD sources say

By
Larry Celona,
Craig McCarthy and
Jorge Fitz-Gibbon
Published June 20, 2023
Updated June 20, 2023, 6:46 p.m. ET

The vagrant sought in a series of random subway slashings was nabbed by eagle-eyed cops on a street corner Tuesday — eating a bag of chips after he got kicked off an MTA bus for fare evasion, police said.

Alleged maniac Kemal Rideout, 28, was busted by a trio of officers and their sergeant after the cops recognized him from a wanted poster around 9:40 a.m. at East 122nd Street and Second Avenue in East Harlem, police said. 

Police said Rideout was apprehended while casually munching chips after he was booted from a bus for trying to beat the fare.

He was charged with three counts of felony assault for his alleged attacks on three female strangers in Manhattan on Sunday.

The suspect has five prior busts in the state — one of them in the Big Apple — including for attempted rape, assault, criminal mischief and forcible touching, and has a history of mental illness, according to authorities.

In at least three of the cases, including the attempted rape, he pleaded “not responsible” because of mental disease or defect, and a criminal-mischief charge against him in another instance was dismissed on those grounds, sources said. 

Rideout was taken to the NYPD’s Transit District 4 in Manhattan after being captured during a two-day manhunt by cops, then walked out Tuesday afternoon and hauled off to Bellevue Hospital, cops said.

The suspect, wearing a pink polo shirt and tan pants and wearing a mask, was viciously heckled by bystanders as cops led him out of the 14th Street-Union Square station shortly before 4:30 p.m.

“I’ll slap you! I’ll slap you!” a man yelled after poking fun at the suspect’s tight-fitting pink shirt. “You ain’t got a mother, you piece of s–t.”

Suspect in Manhattan subway slashings.
The suspect in a series of random subway slashes in Manhattan is now in police custody, law-enforcement sources said Tuesday.

Rideout seemed to respond, but his words couldn’t be made out.

The crowd then broke into applause as he was led to a waiting ambulance, with one man shouting, “Clap for the officers!” 

Police on Monday had released surveillance footage of the suspect jumping the turnstile at the Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall subway station in Manhattan after the third attack.

He is linked to two slashings at the 86th Street and Lexington Avenue No. 4 train station on the Upper East Side around 4:15 p.m. Sunday and another about 20 minutes later at the Brooklyn Bridge-City Hall station, according to police.

Subway slash victim Bianchelly Diplan.
Bianchelly Diplan, 19, was the first of three women slashed in random Manhattan subway attacks Sunday. Tomas E. Gaston
Manhattan subway slashings.
Three women were slashed in separate Manhattan subway attacks within 20 minutes Sunday, and the suspect was taken into custody Tuesday and is being questioned by cops, sources said. James Keivom

The first victim, Bianchelly Diplan, 19, told The Post this week that the creep stared her down, then followed her off the train and slashed the back of her right leg as she climbed the stairs.

“I didn’t know he was behind me on the stairs,” she said. “I felt the cut. It felt like somebody cut me deeply. I looked back at him, and he just stared at me then walked way. I just started crying.”

Diplan said she needed 19 stitches to close the gash.

Police said the suspect cut a second woman at the uptown station before attacking a 28-year-old straphanger at the Brooklyn Bridge station — who sources said was cut so deeply that a tourniquet had to be applied to her leg before she was taken to Bellevue Hospital.

Additional reporting by Joe Marino and Rthvika Suvarna