A New York City man with eight prior arrests and an alleged history of assaulting children is accused of attacking a toddler who was sitting in a wagon Friday morning.
Police said the incident occurred around 6:15 a.m. near Robinson Street and 45th Avenue in Flushing, a neighborhood in Queens, the New York Daily News reported. Christopher Elder, 31, allegedly accosted and began shouting at 48-year-old Maria Zamora, who was taking out the trash, while her 3-year-old granddaughter Sophia sat in a wagon, the New York Post reported.
A criminal complaint obtained by the Post alleges Elder grabbed onto the wagon that carried Sophia and began shaking it before kicking it into the street.
Sophia sustained a facial laceration after landing on the pavement and was taken to a hospital for stitches, per the Daily News.
“She’s very scared, she has too much pain in her face,” Sophia’s uncle, Juan Loja, told WNBC.
Zamora phoned the police, who apprehended Elder near 45th Avenue and Kissena Boulevard, according to the Daily News. Elder underwent a psychiatric evaluation at a hospital later Friday. He was arraigned Saturday and charged with third-degree assault, endangering the welfare of a child, and second-degree harassment, online court records show. He is being held on a $10,000 cash bond.
Luja said the family had seen Elder in their neighborhood before, and they are now terrified to stay in their residence, according to WNBC.
Minutes before he allegedly attacked little Sophia and accosted her grandmother, he was allegedly banging on the door of his uncle, who has a protection order against him and lives in the same building as the Zamoras, according to the Post. A criminal complaint obtained by the outlet notes he kicked the door so violently it came off the hinges. He was charged with criminal mischief and criminal contempt on Saturday.
NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig told the Daily News that Elder has eight prior arrests on his rap sheet, most of which were for unprovoked assaults. Last December, he allegedly attacked a mother and her nine-year-old daughter in Queens, court documents state.
The woman, who did not want to be identified, told WNBC that she noticed Elder was about to strike her daughter, so she grabbed the nine-year-old to shield her. She says Elder then began hitting both of them:
He hit me mostly in the back of my head, my back. He ended up hitting my daughter too, in the face,, on the forehead. Afterwards, when he was done hitting us on the floor, I was just so upset that nobody helped, nobody stopped him and I’m even more mad that he did it again.
The concerned mother then laid into New York state lawmakers for being soft on crime:
I think you guys should wake up and make changes. Or maybe you guys are just waiting for something to happen to your loved ones in order for change to be made. Or you guys just want him to kill someone in order for him to go to jail. He’s not gonna stop and all these other individuals are not gonna stop as well. I think enough is enough.
He was booked on assault and harassment charges in connection to the incident, though the Queens Prosecutor’s Office said bail was set in the case, the New York Post reported.
The same day he allegedly attacked the mother and her nine-year-old, he allegedly slugged a 66-year-old man in the face, the Post noted. Police said that on February 25, he allegedly used a glass bottle to hit a 30-year-old man in the head in Queens, according to the outlet. He was charged with assault with intent to cause physical injury with a weapon and second-degree harassment, online court records show.