ELMHURST — The grandfather injured outside a Queens school in a confrontation with a resident of a local homeless shelter said he's still recovering from his injuries — as hostility continues to simmer between shelter residents and opponents from the community.
Mei Hua Wang, 69, said he was rushing in the rain to pick up his granddaughter at P.S. 102 on Oct. 28 when he passed David McLean, 39, a resident of the controversial Pan Am shelter, walking with two children.
In an apparent series of misunderstandings, Wang began staring at McLean, who took offense amid a climate where shelter foes have made numerous attempts to evict the residents.
McLean — who would later file a police report saying he only pushed Wang in self-defense because Wang kept "staring at me and my family" — first caught Wang's attention by pointing in his direction, Wang said.
"I thought that the man was blaming me for being late to pick up my granddaughter," Wang told DNAinfo New York through a Fujianese translator.
After passing McLean on the street, Wang turned to look back — thinking the young girl who accompanied McLean and whose face was obscured with an umbrella might be Wang's granddaughter.
"The girl was carrying the umbrella, it was blocking her whole face, but I felt like she was the same height as my granddaughter," Wang said. "After I passed I turned seven steps and turned around and thought ‘maybe that was my granddaughter.'"
McLean turned, too, Wang said, and they made eye contact. Wang turned back around once he realized he didn't know the girl, walked a few steps and suddenly felt a blow to his back.
"All of a sudden, he punched me [in the spine] ... and he pushed me to the ground," Wang said.
McLean kept walking, he said.
"The pain was so unbearable I could not lift myself up," he said. "I was crying for help."
A neighbor eventually came to pick up Wang's granddaughter, and he slowly walked the few blocks home in excruciating pain, he said.
He went to the hospital hours later when his daughter-in-law came home, and had surgery for a compressed fracture. He stayed in the hospital for five days, unable to move, he said.
Wang, bedridden since the attack, said he's been unable to earn the extra cash he provided for his family from taking out neighbors' trash.
"I feel pain, I can’t do anything barely," he said. "All I can do is lay on my back."
McLean filed a police report against Wang with the 110th Precinct the day after the incident, but on Nov. 18, he was arrested and charged with assault. He's due back in court on Jan. 21, 2016.
McLean told police that Wang "would not stop staring at me and my family," according to the criminal complaint. "I pushed him to protect my kids. I didn't push him that hard."
A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeless Services said the agency "will assist the NYPD during the investigation" but did not say if McLean still lives at the shelter.
Since the shelter opened in June 2014, there have been many protests organized by local civic groups — some upset at the conditions in the shelter and others not wanting the shelter in the neighborhood at all.
Wang said he's still afraid, even though he has an order of protection against McLean.
"Why doesn’t DHS protect the community?" he said.
Some shelter residents say they feel unwelcome in the community, and are often stared at walking around Elmhurst.
"[Neighbors] look at me, they even stare at my kids," said a mom who lives at the shelter said outside P.S. 102 on a recent morning. She declined to give her name because she has been told by DHS she can't speak to the press. "They don't really like us."
The woman added that she and other residents need the shelter to get back on their feet.
"We're not trying to destroy the neighborhood," she said. "I'm just trying to get out of here."
