Witness Testifies In Motorcycle Melee Trial: 'They Had No Compassion'
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A witness to the 2013 Manhattan motorcycle melee testified in court Tuesday that she watched from her third-floor window as a group of angry bikers pulled a driver from his SUV and beat him.
Annalisa Vega testified in the gang assault trial of undercover Detective Wojciech Braszczok and co-defendant Robert Sims, WCBS 880's Irene Cornell reported.
The victim, Alexian Lien, had fled the West Side Highway in his Range Rover after being surrounded by motorcyles, running over one biker in the process.
Witness Testifies In Motorcycle Melee Trial: 'They Had No Compassion'
Vega told of seeing a lot of motorcycles, the bikers screaming obscenities, breaking the windows of the SUV, dragging the driver out and beating him up after he came to a stop on West 178th Street.
"It was horrible what I was seeing," Vega said. "He was just one, and they were too many. They had no compassion."
Lien's wife and child were with him in the SUV.
He was taken to the hospital for stitches to his face and was also injured on the hands and torso.
Braszczok, who stands out in his multicolored helmet, is seen in numerous videos. He's charged with taking part in the melee, breaking a rear window near where the child sat in her car seat and then standing by and doing nothing to help as Lien was beaten bloody.
Defense attorney John Arlia has said Braszczok was acting as a policeman who had just seen an SUV crush a biker and that he did not go on the attack.
Eleven men were indicted after the incident. The others have pleaded guilty to charges including assault and riot. One of the bikers was sentenced earlier this month to a year in prison.
