A female journalist working at a New York radio station posted a video on YouTube last Saturday (August 17), detailing a recent attack she experienced on a Manhattan street that left her severely injured; at the same time she reported the incident, another woman nearby was also slapped. The journalist believed that these were crimes of hatred against women. She hoped that other women who have had similar experiences would contact her to help the police apprehend these criminals.
The 40-year-old female journalist is named Kelly Dillon, a senior traffic reporter at 1010 WINS radio. After finishing work late at night on Tuesday and early Wednesday morning, she left the office building in Hudson Square to take a car back to her home in New Jersey. As she crossed the intersection of Hudson St and Kings St, she heard footsteps behind her.
She was carrying a designer handbag and holding a phone in her hand.
“It’s a quiet street with few people at night, so I always stay alert when walking on the street, as I’ve heard of many incidents of women being randomly attacked, even in broad daylight,” Kelly said in the video she recorded. “I know the city is getting worse, so as a young woman, I’ve always been cautious.”
After hearing the footsteps, she caught a glimpse out of the corner of her eye of what seemed like a man jogging behind her. Since it’s not uncommon for people to jog at night in New York City, she didn’t think much of it and intentionally moved aside a bit, hoping he would just run past.
But suddenly, her hair was grabbed, and she was forcefully pushed to the ground by someone, causing Kelly to fall instantly. She said in the video, “It happened so fast, I immediately tried to stand up, my adrenaline must have been high, and I did manage to stand up, seeing the assailant running back in the direction where he came from.”
“Shocked and thinking to myself: Oh my God, I need to get home!” A few seconds later, Kelly started screaming for help. Several young men ran over to assist.
“Ma’am, you’re bleeding!” Kelly heard people telling her, and that’s when she noticed her elbow was bleeding, realizing she was injured.
While Kelly’s attack was unfortunate, she also considered herself lucky. Firstly, she expressed repeated gratitude in the video to the “beautiful souls” of New Yorkers who helped her, even risking themselves to catch the culprit, including those young men and the bar owner and staff nearby who were closing up. Another reason was that she realized her elbow had ended up pierced on the metal railing near a flower basket on the roadside, saying, “Thank goodness it wasn’t my head.”
Kelly also thanked the police who arrived promptly, describing them as “friendly and serious” but calm about the incident, as if this attack was just “another one.” She wasn’t surprised by their attitude, as she knew that “this type of crime is the new normal in New York City.”
Upon seeing the police, Kelly began to feel pain all over her body. Paramedics suspected she might have a concussion and took her to the hospital where she received stitches. While reporting the incident, she heard that another woman nearby had been slapped, but the police found no attackers.
From her own experience, Kelly believed that such attacks were specifically targeting women, yet this kind of violence was not being taken seriously enough. She mentioned that when she filmed the video, her case had not been reported by any media outlets, leading her to speculate that many attacks on women go unreported.
Kelly said the assailants didn’t even attempt to steal her designer handbag and phone, so robbery wasn’t their motive; the man had a good physique and was “definitely not a mentally unstable homeless person”; the force used to push her down was deliberate; the assailants may have targeted women “randomly,” but their intentions were not “random.”
Although Kelly’s body hadn’t fully recovered at the time of making the video, she was determined to collect and report on these attacks targeting women to help the police break down the criminal network.
“I don’t blame the police, but the city is trying to downplay the severity of the violence happening,” Kelly said. “Without a doubt, the police are the heart and soul of combating crime and protecting all of us, but some higher-ups in government are downplaying public safety. New York streets are unsafe for women, frankly, for anyone.”
Kelly left her email address ([email protected]) and hoped that New York women who have had similar experiences would reach out to her.