73-Year-Old Navy Veteran Slashed, Robbed In Violent Bronx Home Invasion
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – Police are hoping surveillance video will lead them to the suspect who attacked and robbed a 73-year-old Navy veteran in the Bronx.
Investigators say the man caught on camera forced his way into the man's apartment last month and grabbed a kitchen knife.
"He came in. He grabbed a knife from my kitchen sink, a butcher knife, and he came after me," the victim, named John said.
Surveillance video caught the suspect seconds before the attack. He was seen calmly walking down an alley and into the apartment building on Crotona Park North in the Tremont section of the Bronx.
"I opened the door without asking who it is and this guy pushed his way in."
It happened on Jan. 23, but John told CBS2's Marc Liverman he's still too terrified to show his face on camera or give us his last name.
The 73-year-old veteran says as soon as the suspect was inside he kept repeating the same thing.
"He kept saying he wanted the money, he wanted the money."
John says the attacker grabbed a knife from his counter and slashed his wrists and arms.
Then - seeming to know where to go - he went straight to the bedroom and grabbed $2,000 in cash from underneath the victim's new mattress.
"There's three people in the world who knew that I had that money, I'm one of the three and the other two are the guys who delivered the bed," John explained.
The victim believes it wasn't one of the movers, but somehow his attacker knew where to go for the cash.
"I was bleeding pretty good and once he had the money he left."
Police say when the suspect got to the street he took off on foot, but they're still not clear which direction he headed in after that.
In a final act of cruelty, the suspect took John's cell phone and house phone on his way out so the senior couldn't call 911.