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Radio Free Montone: 'Is This Really Happening?'

By John Montone, 1010 WINS

More and more criminals are being caught on camera.

For the past three decades I have covered so many shootings, stabbings, murders and rapes.  In reporting on these violent anti-social acts I always try to remember that while it may be just another assignment to me, there are victims and the families of those victims for whom life may never be the same.  Now in recent years the inexplicable evil of these attacks has been made more real to me by the surveillance cameras that trace our movements on almost every street and avenue in the city.

Crown Heights, Brooklyn Mugging Suspects
Police say these men attacked a woman in Crown Heights on Oct. 2, 2014. (credit: NYPD)

On Tuesday my report on an assault and robbery in Crown Heights included a reference to surveillance video that the NYPD shared with us and that we posted at 1010wins.com. Less than a minute in length and shot in black and white, the clip showed a young lady walking along Franklin Avenue near Prospect Place. Walking in the opposite direction were three men, one of whom suddenly grabbed 21-year old Gwendolyn Reyes from behind and flung her into the wall of a building.  In an interview with CBS-2 News, Reyes told reporter Hazel Sanchez that she wondered, "Is this really happening?"

Listen: Radio Free Montone

It was. Reyes appears to be struggling with her attacker who then belts her in the face, Ray Rice-like, twice.  As she crumples to the sidewalk in a heap, the thug walks away as if he has lost interest.  We then see his accomplices pulling the pocketbook that is hanging from her shoulder and dragging her bleeding along the ground.  Reyes, an aspiring model, suffered a broken nose and a deep gash on her right cheek.

At the end of my report on the attack I mentioned the video on our website and gave out the phone number for the Crime Stoppers hotline.  Then rather than the standard, "Please call if you have any information that may lead to the apprehension of the suspects," I issued a more strongly  worded, emotional appeal asking for the public, "… to help the police put these thugs behind bars."

When you get to watch a crime like this one it becomes personal.

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