A mom waiting to pick up her daughter from a Lower Manhattan dance class had her brand-new car stolen by a “brazen” carjacking trio just blocks from federal court and City Hall, according to cops and the victim.
The 44-year-old woman – who did not want to be identified – was parked at Broadway and Reade streets, waiting for her 11-year-old daughter to finish class at a nearby dance school, around 8 p.m. Tuesday when the callous crew stormed up to her Audi, which she had left running.
“All of a sudden, my door opens… the back door on my side, and also the passenger door,” the woman told The Post by phone. “And at first, I thought it was my daughter, [but it was] too soon.”
“And I look up and see a man in a mask and he just told me to get out,” she said.
By that point, the Brooklynite, who works in financial services in Midtown, knew she was in trouble.
“I said, ‘Oh my God,’” she said. “I immediately kind of figured out what was happening….I didn’t see the other faces. I only saw him, and I was like, ‘OK.’”
“I grabbed my bag, grabbed the key, and I got out, stood on the corner of the street, and I started screaming for help…that I was being carjacked,” she recalled.
Two good Samaritans rushed to her side, with one of them calling 911 as the victim phoned her husband.
But the thieves soon realized their victim still had her car key and demanded she fork it over – so she hurled it into the street.
“I kind of wanted to throw it in the middle of Broadway, so maybe it will be crushed by a car, so I threw it far,” she said. “But they got it and then they just drove off.”
Cops from the NYPD’s 1st Precinct responded in less than a minute and took the victim into their cruiser to search for the suspects – to no avail – before bringing her back to pick up her daughter, she said.
Officers drove both mother and daughter home, and ultimately found the unoccupied car around 10:20 p.m. in Canarsie, Brooklyn, according to police and the victim.
But the Audi – which the victim had only had for two weeks – was “completely totaled,” she said.
“It’s not drivable,” she said. “When they found it, it looked OK – it just had a dent, but [the suspects] completely destroyed the entire suspension.”
Still, the startled mom said she was grateful that “nobody got hurt.”
“I was very shaken that this could happen when there’s so many people walking around, where it’s presumably a safe area, and they just are so brazen to do that [when] there’s a lot of police presence around there too,” she said.
She said she wouldn’t change anything about the police response, which was “just incredible.”
“I don’t know what all they could be doing [differently],” she said. “I think this was done by what seemed like professionals and probably targeting a woman who they, I assume, won’t fight back.”
No arrests had been made by Wednesday, police said.
What do you think? Post a comment.