Two teenage girls out to lunch with their parents at Grand Central Terminal were stabbed in an unprovoked Christmas Day attack, authorities said.
MTA Police quickly apprehended the attacker, who they say had no connection to the 14- and 16-year-old girls. He faces attempted murder and assault as hate crimes, among other charges. The MTA identified him as 36-year-old Esteban Esono-Asue, also known as Steven Hutcherson.
Esono-Asue is also accused of criminal possession of a weapon with prior conviction and child endangerment.
According to MTA Police, he allegedly approached the girls and their parents, who were visiting New York City over the holidays from Paraguay, at Tartinery Café in the dining concourse shortly before 11:30 a.m. Monday.
Chaos soon erupted, with some customers running from the scene of the attack.
According to the criminal complaint, when Esono-Asue was seated at a table, he told an employee "I don't want to sit with Black people," then made a comment used a racial slur about white people. Esono-Asue initially was asked to leave the Tartinery dining area by an employee, who said Esono-Asue responded by saying: “I'll leave, I don't want the white man to get at you,” or something similar, the complaint stated.
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After being served a water, Esono-Asue took a knife from his pocket and lunged at the family, stabbing one of the girls in the back an employee told detectives. As the family scrambled to get away, the man stabbed the younger girl in the thigh, MTA officials said.
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The manager of Tartinery said she had noticed the man acting erratically prior to the stabbing and she had a gut feeling something was off with the man when he entered.
"They had no idea he was even there, and he just pulled out a knife and stabbed one girl in the back," she said.
Both teenagers were taken to Bellevue Hospital for treatment. One of the teens suffered a collapsed lung, but both are expected to recover. Esono-Asue had 17 prior arrests, police said, with the most recent coming on Nov. 7 when he allegedly threatened to shoot a man in the Bronx. For that incident, he pleaded guilty to an assault charge and was given a conditional discharge
An investigation into the Sunday morning incident is ongoing.
The Paraguayan consulate general's office in New York said the office was assisting the family. They were visiting New York City from Paraguay and have requested privacy, consulate Luis Dominguez said Wednesday.
At his arraignment, Esono-Asue was ordered held without bail pending his next court appearance, scheduled for Friday. A Legal Aid Society attorney representing him declined to comment.
