Bronx District Attorney Darcel D. Clark announced Friday, May 17, that a Bronx man has been sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree assault in the vicious beating of an MTA employee at a Bronx subway station.

 

“Without provocation, the defendant punched and kicked a 75-year-old MTA employee who was in uniform on his way to work,” Clark said. “We will not stand for assaults on transit workers, the backbone of our subway system.”

 

The district attorney said the defendant, Anthony Williams, 31, of Bronx Boulevard, the Bronx, was sentenced on Friday to five years in prison and five years post release supervision for second-degree assault by Bronx Supreme Court Justice Ralph Fabrizio.

 

She said he pleaded guilty on March 20, to that charge, as well as to attempted assault in the second degree for punching a correction officer in the face while he was incarcerated at Rikers Island on Jan. 24, 2023. Williams was sentenced to 1½ to 3 years in that case. She added that both sentences are to run concurrently.

 

According to the investigation, on Sept. 12, 2023, at 9:15 p.m. Baboo Singh, 75, a station agent with the MTA, was in uniform, on his way to start his shift. While standing on the southbound platform of the Nereid Avenue subway station in Wakefield, Singh was approached by Williams who, without warning, punched him in the right eye, causing Singh to fall to the ground. Williams then punched and kicked Singh multiple times in the head and body. Singh suffered a fractured nose and jawbone.

 

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Juan Pucha of the Rikers Island Prosecution Bureau under the supervision of Edward Uy, deputy chief of the Rikers Island Prosecution Bureau, and Jose Arocho, chief of the Rikers Island Prosecution Bureau, and under the overall supervision of Denise Kodjo, deputy chief of the Investigations Division, and Wanda Perez-Maldonado, chief of the Investigations Division.

 

Clark thanked Trial Preparation Assistant Tamara Hall of the Rikers Island Prosecution Bureau for her assistance with the case, as well as NYC Department of Correction Investigator Daniel Monaco, NYPD Detective Steven Kendricks of the 49^th Precinct Squad, and Keisha Stewart, special officer with the Bronx District Attorney’s Office.