NYPD Officer Slashed While Breaking Up Fight In Brooklyn
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - An NYPD officer was slashed breaking up a fight early Sunday morning, the NYPD said.
The female officer was slashed from neck to cheek with a box cutter while responding to a dispute at Saratoga Avenue and Marion Street at around 1:10 a.m., police said.
The officer, whose name has not been released, was taken to New York Methodist Hospital where she was treated and released. She was in plain clothes at the time of the incident.
Xiomora Velez, 27, was arrested. Velez faces charges of assaulting an officer, menacing, resisting arrest and weapons possession.
The slashing was just one of at least four this weekend. Police released surveillance video of two suspects stabbing and slashing a woman in the Bronx.
Since the beginning of the year, the NYPD said there has been more than 530 slashings or stabbings across the city compared to just over 440 during the same period last year. That's a 20 percent increase.
Community activist Tony Herbert said the violence needs to stop.
"I want to say this to every young black and Hispanic male and female in our community – we are killing ourselves. We're creating a modern-day genocide that truly is wiping out a generation that is going to take away from our community being able to move forward," Herbert said. "We can't keep doing this."
