A violent attack in Chelsea which was captured on surveillance video left an injured a tourist and her friend as he tried to grab a bag from them last month.
“I don’t really consider myself a victim. I fought it as well as I could,” Natalia said. Natalia did not wan CBS2 to include her last name, but she spoke to Carlin about what happened to her on West 15th Street the night of June 26. Heading home from dinner at around 9:30 p.m., the man in the video grabs and then drags Natalia, in a battle over a bag that she had over one shoulder.
Being pulled into a metal pole then dragged across pavement left a gash on Natalia’s head, which she said required 10 stitches. Her friend was punched in the face by the suspect, and at that moment another man walked up, a stranger who they were glad arrived when he did.
“He just came and the robber guy just let go of my bag,” Natalia said. “The back of her head was completely bloody,” said Adriana Mariella, who ran over to the women and handed them her phone.“He actually came back for her when they looked at the security footage. When we were inside the building. I let her come in,” Mariella said.
Natalia, who is a native of Russia and recently graduated with an MBA, said she’s still in the process of choosing where she’ll settle down. Perhaps, it will be London. New York City was her first choice, and it still is.
“My love to New York cannot be changed by this,” she said. “My advice to women: don’t have your bag across like this.”
Investigators say it was a crime of opportunity by a man the two women did not know. He went for a bag, but they weren’t giving it up.