Cops Seek Panhandler Who Fractured Skull of Customer Inside East Village Noodle Shop

A panhandler inside an East Village noodle shop wacked a customer on the head with a metal rod, cops said after the victim refused to give him any money.

The 60 year-old victim was seated inside the Meee Noodle shop on First Ave. near 13th St. in the East Village, when he was approached by a pandhandled. When the victim told the panhandler he only had a credit card suspect reached inside his jacket and struck the victim in the head with a metal rod.

It was the second time in a month in the vicinity of E. 14th St. and First Ave. that someone was clobbered with a metal rod after refusing to give money to a panhandler.

Cops did not say if they thought to the two incidents about a month apart were related.

The scene of the latest crime was listed only as “in the vicinity of First Ave and E. 14th Street” by police.

But a more detailed account of the attack was posted by a user of the Next Door app.

”A panhandler attacked a customer at MEE Noodle shop (223 First Ave) around 2:30 p.m. on Fri. 10/18,” wrote a user of the app identified only as Lucy C from Kips Bay.

According to that account, “Detectives are investigating whether the panhandler is the same person who also attacked a woman nearby with a metal pipe after she refused to give him money sources told PIX11 News.”

“The victim was transported by EMS to NYC Health and Hospitals/Bellevue,” a police spokesperson told Our Town Downtown. The suspect “fled on foot” and as of Nov 4 there was still no arrest. “The investigation remains ongoing,” a police spokesperson said.

The neighborhood around along E. 14th St. between First Ave. and Ave. “A” has been problem plagued for quite some time. Police in sweeps have finally cleared out what locals dubbed ‘the Thieves Market” where homeless people were said to be selling stolen goods and dealing drugs from blankets set up on the sidewalk.

In Feb., a homeless person identified as Roberto Ortiz, 28, was arrested for allegedly attacking a church worker at Immaculate Conception Church who had attempted to stop him from urinating between parked cars while Mass was underway. The suspect slashed the church worker, identified John Mach, in the neck. He staggered to nearby Beth Israel Hospital two blocks away where it took 16 stitches to close the wound caused by a box cutter.

In June 2023, the Immaculate Conception School, which had operated in the area since around the time of the Civil War, closed its doors on E. 14th St. Church officials blamed the ongoing presence of the illegal open-air drug and stolen goods market as a contributing factor to the school’s failure to regain enrollment following the falloff during the pandemic.

But it was not until a man was killed in a drug dispute further down E. 14th St. near Ave. “A” in June that a prolonged crackdown began with officers from the 9th Precinct setting up a mobile command center on Ave A. and E. 14th St.

In that incident, police arrested Alejandro Piedra, 30, of Dewitt Avenue in Brooklyn at the scene. He was charged with murder and assault for fatally stabbing one man, who had come to the aid of another victime, indefitified as his wife who was stabbed in the leg. Unlike the two earlier cases, the pipe wielding suspect--or suspects--from the two attacks in September and October remains at large.