A man is being held on charges of attempted murder after he pushed a Muslim woman into the path of an oncoming London Underground train.
CCTV footage shows the man standing behind the woman before pushing her on the path of the train as it arrives.
The victim slams into the train before rebounding onto the platform, as commuters rush to help her. The incident occurred at Piccadilly Circus station on a Bakerloo line platform.
A spokesperson for the British Transport Police reported that the woman received minor injuries during the incident.
Director of enforcement and on-street operations at Transport for London, Steve Burton said, “This type of shocking incident is extremely rare.”
“Our staff acted quickly to assist the woman and other customers at the scene, and we are working closely with the police as they carry out their investigation.”
The suspect is in custody and is due to appear at Blackfriars Crown Court on November 25. It has not yet been established whether the attack was racially motivated.A Muslim woman was brutally punched near the State Library in Melbourne on Thursday by an unknown attacker who immediately fled.
A witness described the attack as a ‘brutal punch’ and said a shirtless man walked past the 21-year-old woman before “he turned around and punched her on the side of the head”.
“It was a brutal punch. Once that happened he tripped her and she fell right to the ground. I got up and screamed at him and he backed off. People came to aid the girl and call the ambulance,” 16-year-old Muhammad, who declined to give his last name, told Guardian Australia.The teenager further said that he followed the man until the next street crossing. “That’s when he noticed me and my friend were following him, and he said we should back off. He took a knife out, metres from us,” he added.
When Muhammad confronted the perpetrator and accused him of a racial attack, he replied he was “not racist”.According to Fairfax Media, the attacker allegedly ripped off the woman’s hijab after tripping her and twice punching her. However, police has since said they have no reason to believe the assault was racially motivated.
Acting sergeant Shaun Toohey said on Friday, “Police had no information as to what the motivation was for the attack, and there was nothing to say it had been racially motivated.”
“The victim said nothing was said to her. She just felt the strike to head,” Toohey said.
The acting sergeant further said that the victim was “surprised” when she read reports in the media that the attack was racially motivated.
Police also gave details about the attacker and described him as Caucasian, 183cm tall and approximately 45-years-old with a slim build, short light-coloured hair and a beard, with a tattoo on his upper right arm. Further, he was shirtless at the time of the attack.In September last year, then commissioner of Victoria police Ken Lay had said attacks against Muslim women in particular had risen since the death of terrorism suspect, Abdul Numan Haider.
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