A 17-year-old girl from Woodhaven was stabbed in the back at least 10 times on Monday night as she prepared to climb the front steps of her home on 85th Street off 88th Avenue, according to police.
Natasha Martinez was coming home from her job at McDonald’s in Ozone Park and as she approached her home, the attacker came up behind her and repeatedly plunged a kitchen knife into her body., authorities said.
The blood soaked sidewalk outside the house where Natasha Martinez, 17, was stabbed multiple times. Robert Stridiron/The Forum Newsgroup
The teenager’s screams sent her mother out onto the street to see what had happened. “I [heard] someone say Mommy, Mommy,” said Wendy Martinez. At first she said she thought that her daughter may have forgotten her keys. But upon opening the front door, she found her child covered in blood.
At her home, the tearful, frightened mother told reporters about her horror the night before, “You are holding your child that is bleeding and you feel like you are almost dead. She told me ‘Mommy I am almost going.’ But I told her, ‘no, no. You don’t have to go. You got to stay alive’.”
She used a towel to try and stop the bleeding; gashes were all over the girl’s upper torso and back, some of them “really deep.” Martinez, 40, clutched her child as she waited for what she says was about 20 minutes for an ambulance. When paramedics arrived they rushed her to Jamaica Hospital where doctors performed surgery, to remove her spleen and replace a damaged vein in her arm with one taken from her leg.
Meanwhile, the usually quiet community is in shock over the brutal attack. Neighbors filed past the blood stained sidewalk on Tuesday morning, almost unwilling to accept that this could happen in their quiet community. “You just don’t have this kind of crime here,” said Robert Bastillo who lives around the corner. “My wife walks our dogs at that time every night,” he said shaking his head and referring to the half hour between 11 and 11:30 p.m. around when Natasha was stabbed.”That’s not going to fly anymore.”
A bloody handprint on the hood of the car where the victim was brutally attacked by her unknown assailant.
And other neighbors grew more concerned over the attack. Betty, who has lived in the area for more than 50 years, stared at the blood stains and said she was on her way to St. Thomas the Apostle to say a prayer for the victim and her family. “For God’s sake, she’s a teenager—she didn’t even live long enough to make an enemy like this. This lunatic could’ve stabbed anybody.” She held her hands up at both sides. “I’m 84 years-old. Do you think I could take a knife to my back and live?” Civic leaders and elected officials also expressed their concern over the apparent randomness of the attack. President of the Woodhaven Residents Block Association Ed Wendell posted a small piece of video surveillance released by the NYPD on the WRBA Facebook page to alert neighbors. The footage is not very clear, but police hope it will still help in the suspects identification.
“For now we will reach out to the family just to let them know we are there,” said Wendell. “Afterwards we will be there to help them for anything they need.” “We don’t have stab wounds,” said Wendell, “but all of us were attacked.”
Video footage of the man police believe is responsible for the stabbing was taken from a residential camera and is from minutes after the attack. The video can be seen on YouTube and shows the suspect repeatedly turning around and looking behind him as he travels away from the scene.
Police recovered a small knife at the scene and will continue an investigation into any possible motives and confirmed that Martinez got a “good look” at her attacker and did not know him.
On Wednesday, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly released a statement in which he said the department was considering a possible connection between the knife wielding suspect who attacked Natasha Martinez and a health attendant who was similarly attacked in late June just a block from her home on 105th Avenue and 221st Street.
The suspect is described as a black male, about 5’6“ tall, 150 pounds, and wearing a white hoodie and dark colored pants.
Natasha Martinez is expected to make a recovery but officials said that her father is now in the same hospital after suffering a heart attack while visiting with his daughter.
Anyone with information is urged to call Crimestoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS.
Robert Stridiron contributed to this story.
By Patricia Adams
