A man was charged on Monday for stab a stranger in the back with a knife after the two encountered each other at an East Village subway station, police said.
Raymond Kwok, 27, who was arrested around 4:45 p.m. in Manhattan, lives in the East Village near the L train station at 1st Ave. and East 14th St. where the stabbing occurred. He was charged with assault and criminal possession of a weapon, police said.
The arrest came a day after police released a photo of Kwok taken from the MTA’s security camera and asked for the public’s help in identifying him.
Around 8:43 p.m. Friday, the 29-year-old victim had just exited a Brooklyn-bound L train at the subway station when he unknowingly “bumped into” Kwok, who then “brandished a knife” and stabbed the victim in the back, according to police.
At first, the victim did not realize he had been stabbed, according to a security guard who witnessed the attack.
“He never saw it coming,” the witness told the Daily News on Sunday. “He screamed, ‘Someone hit me.’ But then we looked and we saw all the blood.”
Medics transported the victim to Bellevue Hospital in stable condition.
With Kerry Burke