Teenage Filipino tourist assaulted in New York

MANILA • An 18-year-old Filipino tourist was assaulted in Manhattan last week in a case that the Philippine Consulate-General in New York said was yet to be established as a racist attack.

"Based on information received by the consulate this afternoon, the victim was walking with three other Filipinos near the corner of 6th Avenue and 46th Street when he was assaulted," the Consulate-General said in a July 15 advisory.

It further detailed that the male victim from Cebu incurred facial injuries, and said the suspect was later "subdued and turned over to the authorities".

The attack is the 41st criminal act involving Filipinos in New York since 2021. The Consulate-General said it is coordinating with the New York City Police Department to find out more about the incident, noting that it has yet to confirm if this is an anti-Asian hate crime.

It urged the Filipino community to "exercise the necessary precautions while on the streets or in the subways" of New York City.

In March, three elderly Filipinos, including a 67-year-old grandmother who was kicked and punched over a hundred times by her attacker, were assaulted a few days apart also in New York.

The latest assault also happened barely a month after a 35-year-old Filipino lawyer, who was visiting his relatives in the United States, was shot and killed in what Philippine Consul-General Elmer Cato described as an apparent case of mistaken identity.

The lawyer and his mother were on their way to Philadelphia International Airport to catch a flight to Chicago on June 18 when the assailant fired at the Uber vehicle taking them to the airport.

PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER/ ASIA NEWS NETWORK