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Suspect in Subway Hate Attacks Has History of Bias Crimes, Records Show

By Aidan Gardiner | January 6, 2017 12:21pm | Updated on January 9, 2017 8:52am
 Sherlock Arana once threatened a family saying
Sherlock Arana once threatened a family saying "I hate Spanish people, I want to kill them all," police said.
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NYPD

QUEENS — A man with a history of bias attacks in the subway punched two Indian women in separate Queens stations in what the NYPD is investigating as a pattern of hate crimes, they said.

Sherlock Arana, 28, made "anti-ethnic" remarks to an 18-year-old woman and then punched her in the face inside the 88th Street A train station, near Liberty Avenue, about 9:20 a.m. on Dec. 8, police said.

A month later, at about 12:30 p.m. on Jan. 5, Arana offered to swipe a 30-year-old woman into the 169th Street F train station in exchange for cash, but she declined, police said.

He proceeded to punch her in the back of the head, knocking her to the ground where she hit her head again, police said.

She was treated at the scene, officials said.

Arana — who fled the scene and remains on the lam as of Friday — had been released without bail in September after pleading guilty to threatening a family at knifepoint in the Jamaica—179th Street station while saying "I hate Spanish people, I want to kill them all," according to court records.

He had been slated to be sentenced for that case on Jan. 9, according to court records.

In that case, he walked up to a woman who was with her boyfriend and his 3-year-old daughter on Aug. 3 and said to the boyfriend, "I hate Spanish people. Suck my d--k. I am going to punch you in the face. I am going to kill you. Get away from the cameras," prosecutors said.

When the family walked away from him and passed through the turnstiles, Arana jumped over the turnstiles and pulled a kitchen knife from his bag, saying, "Come over here. I have something for you," according to the Queens District Attorney's office.

"I am going to stab you, your wife and your kid," he said, according to prosecutors.

He has been arrested 29 times before, according to police and prosecutors. Details of those incidents were not immediately available.

Anyone with information should contact Crime Stoppers at (800) 577-TIPS (8477).