NYPD data: Blades spills even more blood from the Big Apple

Blades cut through the Big Apple.

According to NYPD data requested by The Post, the number of stabbings and slashings citywide rose 6% this year through Aug. 11, to 3,582 incidents, compared to 3,370 during the same period last year.

So far this year, 60 people have died from stabbings – an 11% increase from the 54 cases in 2023.

“There is no reason for so much crime,” Alton Scott, a veteran MTA conductor who needed 34 stitches to close a cut on his neck in March, told the Post.

His attacker is still at large.

In May, 17-year-old Sarah Rivera was killed in a stabbing during a tragic argument with a friend outside a subway station in Queens, friends and relatives reported.

Rivera was reportedly drinking with friends at a park near the 46th Street Station in Sunnyside around 9:30 p.m. when she got into a fatal fight with the 15-year-old acquaintance and was stabbed in the neck. The unnamed attacker is in custody.

“Life has no value,” Sarah's father, Erik Rivera, 50, told the Post this week. He called the rise in stabbings “disturbing” and youth crime “a pandemic.”

“I want justice,” he said of his daughter's murderer. “The full force of the law. I see no remorse.”

The increase in stabbings is due to a “dramatic” increase in youth and gang crime, “unpredictable” emotionally disturbed individuals roaming the streets and an “influx of migrants” who engage in “disorder, robberies and spontaneous confrontations,” said Michael Alcazar., a retired NYPD detective and adjunct professor at John Jay College, said the post.

In February, a 17-year-old migrant was stabbed to death during a violent brawl in Times Square involving dozens of people, including other migrants.

“As the New York Police Department tightens its crackdown on gun ownership, perpetrators are turning to knives instead,” Alcazar added.

Alcazar's colleague David Sarni, a retired NYPD and John Jay detective, noted that more and more people are carrying knives for protection, even though bad guys know they can use the blade to do the dirty work without attracting as much attention – or jail time – as a firearm. “Knives are everywhere… I've seen people get cuts and not notice the cut until they were about a block away,” he said.

The 27-year NYPD veteran said social media is adding fuel to the fire as teens engage in “senseless fights” with weapons. “There's no de-escalation. These kids aren't learning social skills anymore,” he said.

Sarni said the bright city council is not exactly helping to improve the situation.

“I've watched the City Council hearings and I'm not impressed with the action. They seem more concerned with getting the police than with what they can do to stem the wave of violence in our neighborhood? What can we do to deal with the students?”

In June, a 39-year-old man was stabbed in the neck at Milo Coffee Shop in Manhattan – whereupon heroic customers and employees defended themselves against the unscrupulous attackers. The victim survived.

Wanda, an employee at the Java store on Amsterdam Avenue, near West 181st Street, blamed the influx on the mentally ill and immigrants. “They don't have jobs, they want money. They get into trouble.”

She added: “We are seeing things we have not seen before. People are having their cell phones taken away. They are taking away jewellery.

“You are not even safe at work.”

The NYPD said the number of arrests for stabbings and slashings increased by 11% (2,668) this year compared to 2023 (2,411).