With New York City’s robbery rate up 25.3% from two years ago and overall serious crime up 29%, New Yorkers have some real concerns about crime. On Tuesday, November 7th, a good samaritan, John Rote, of Queens, rescued a woman from being robbed, but he was arrested. Rote did not have a concealed handgun permit. This occurred while the NYPD is granting fewer concealed handgun permits after the Supreme Court’s Bruen ruling said it had to issue more permits. In 2021, the NYPD approved 2,591 permits. In 2022, only 1,550 permits were approved. In the six months after the high court’s decision, from June 24, 2022 to Dec. 31, 2022, the NYPD saw a surge in new gun permit applications, from just over 2,000 in the same period a year earlier to nearly 5,000, but the NYPD only approved 503 of them. That means they approved 1,047 in the six months before Bruen.
The 40-year-old woman, who was being robbed, said she felt “pure terror” during Tuesday’s robbery “in the city’s subway system she believes has become increasingly unsafe for riders.” The first quotes below show that while the woman is grateful for the risk that the man took to protect her she wishes that he hadn’t done it with a gun.
As the last statement below makes clear, New York has no tolerance for people using guns to stop crime.
“Of course, I am happy that that man tried to help me and that nobody was injured during this incident, but it’s scary to think that people are carrying guns around the city. I understand why people do it, they see it as their only means of protection,” the woman said. . . .
“In this case the man risked a lot to protect me, his safety, and the safety of other people on the platform. Yes, I do think he is a hero, but I don’t know, I would likely think him a bigger hero if he tried to help me without the gun. In my eyes, the gun is a little extreme. It was a very dangerous situation, anything could have happened.” . . .
Khristina Narizhnaya and Katherine Donlevy, “Woman threatened by homeless would-be mugger wishes ‘hero’ vigilante gunman didn’t fire weapon: ‘I was terrified,’ New York Post, November 10, 2023.
A New York City subway robbery attempt fell apart Tuesday night when an unidentified bystander pulled out a gun and fired a shot inside one of Manhattan’s major subway stations, according to police.
He overheard the would-be mugger demand a woman give him money and threaten to steal her purse, according to authorities. Then he allegedly fired a single shot to save the 40-year-old stranger at the busy 49th Street subway station, near Rockefeller Center, around 9:15 p.m. Tuesday. . . .
Michael Rulz, “Armed vigilante saves woman from would-be robber at major transit hub, police say,” Fox News, November 8, 2023
“I want to be clear: we don’t tolerate this kind of conduct in NYC Transit, period,” the city’s top transit official, Richard Davey, said in a statement after Rote’s arrest. “Once again cameras recorded a perpetrator, and we are grateful the NYPD made an arrest within hours. Thank goodness nobody was hurt here – but what occurred was outrageous, reckless, and unacceptable.”
Michael Rulz, “New York man who saved woman from subway mugging by scaring off would-be robber with warning shot arrested,” Fox News, November 9, 2023.