An eighth suspect has been busted for the Times Square attack on an NYPD officer and lieutenant outside a migrant shelter, police said Tuesday.
The suspect, seen on video wearing a red, white and blue Fila jacket, was arrested in the Bronx Tuesday morning, police said.
Charges against him were pending.
The Jan. 27 attack was caught on video and has intensified the debate about migrants in the city and the country.
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Seven suspects have been indicted and numerous others are being sought, including four who were arrested the night of the attack and, after being released without bail, hopped a bus to California, sparking criticism of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg,
Bragg has pushed back on the criticism, noting the difficulty of prosecuting a case in which some of the suspects changed their clothes after the assault, making it more difficult to determine from video who did what.
After Bragg announced the indictments last Thursday he released police body-worn camera footage that seemed to contradict the NYPD contention that the small group of suspects were blocking pedestrian traffic outside a W. 42nd St. shelter near 7th Ave. when officers first approached.
Pedestrians could be seen on video walking freely past the men.
“Hey! Por favor! Como esta. Vamos. West 41! West 41! Go to West 41! Move! Vamos!” one of the cops is heard saying.
The video shows most of the group immediately complying, singing in unison as they walk away. But one suspect, Yohenry Brito, 24, lags behind and ignores the officers while looking at his phone, then gets confrontational with a cop who tries to nudge him along.
“Don’t touch me,” Brito says in Spanish more than once.
As Brito walks away, he stops to retrieve a baby stroller on the sidewalk. Body-cam footage shows him pushing the stroller and starting to walk away from the cops again before quipping in Spanish that one of the officers looked like the fictional TV character “Ugly Betty.” NYPD Lt. Ben Kurian then grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and throws him up against a wall.
In the footage captured by the lieutenant’s bodycam, Brito repeatedly asks what is happening in Spanish. The situation quickly escalates as Brito tries to escape Kurian’s grasp, with both tumbling to the ground in seconds.
Officer Zunxu Tian then intervened, and several of those with Brito descend on the two cops and repeatedly grab and kick them as they grapple with Brito on the ground, various pieces of footage show.
The cops were treated for bumps and bruises.
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