NYPD adds more cops to subway patrol amid spike in transportation violence as Cuomo urges Big Apple to ‘get it’

Hundreds of more police officers flooded the New York subway to protect webbing straps amid a wave of violent transit crime – as Governor Andrew Cuomo says, it’s up to Big Apple officials to “understand”.

New York City Police Department Chief Kathleen O’Reilly said on Tuesday the department would deploy more than 100 additional officers than planned, with a total of 644 police officers assigned to the subway system amid security concerns over ‘a series of terrifying attacks, officials said.

“We are able to achieve this through overtime, the deployment of officers normally assigned to administrative tasks and the reassignment of other non-transit officers,” she said at a press conference. Tuesday morning, according to the New York Post.

Police officials said earlier this week they would move an additional 500 officers on the metro. But public transport officials argued that was not enough and asked for another 1,000.

The NYPD arrested 21-year-old Rigoberto Lopez on Sunday and charged him with three counts of murder and two counts of attempted murder for his alleged frenzy of cuts along the A-train subway line of Friday to Saturday.

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Lopez – dubbed the “A-Train Ripper” by the New York Post – is accused of fatally stabbing a man and woman and injuring two other straphangers within hours.

Police said the lifeless body of a man was discovered in a subway car in Queens on Friday, with fatal stab wounds to his chest and neck. About two hours later Claudine Roberts, 44, was also found fatally stabbed in a train car in Manhattan.

Lopez reportedly carried out two other non-fatal attacks on adult males at Manhattan subway stations, and police believe all of the victims were homeless.

Investigators later recovered the weapon from the alleged crime, and Lopez confessed to the crimes, according to a criminal complaint. On Monday, a judge ordered his detention without bail.

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“To the victims, to the families of the victims, we are 100% committed to achieving justice… to ending the families of this terrible incident,” NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said at a previous press conference.

In an appearance Tuesday on Spectrum NY1, ahead of O’Reilly’s announcement, Shea said the NYPD had recorded 62 criminal assaults in transit so far this year.

He said the ministry would also seek help from its partners to tackle the issues.

When Governor Cuomo was asked on Monday what he thought of the MTA’s pressure to deploy an additional 1,000 officers to the transit system amid calls for more mental health professionals, the Democratic Governor said he believed people needed “more public safety on the subway.”

“I think you need better safety, public safety in the city in general. I think you need better public safety in the cities, at large, on the whole”, a- he continued at a press conference.

He referred to Rochester, upstate New York, where a recent video shows a 9-year-old girl being pepper sprayed by police. He also mentioned Buffalo – also in the upstate – where police “knocked a protester to the ground,” he said, likely referring to the June 2020 incident in which police were accused of pushing an elderly man onto the sidewalk during a demonstration.

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“All I’m saying in New York is you understand it. You understand it. You have community tensions where they don’t trust the police. You have tensions with the NYPD, where they feel like ‘they can’t do their job, “he said. “It won’t work until you reconcile your relationship, and it needs to be reconciled.”

An NYPD spokesperson did not respond to Fox News requests for comment.

Danielle Wallace of Fox News and The Associated Press contributed to this report.