NYU student targeted in unprovoked attack shares experience on social media, warns of other assaults
An NYU student thrown to the sidewalk in an unprovoked attack while walking to class in lower Manhattan on Monday has shared what she described as the “scariest experience” of her life on social media — and warned her assailant has attacked other women.
Amelia Lewis, 20, was on Broadway when her attacker ran up and struck her from behind near Waverly Place in Greenwich Village around 9:20 a.m., cops said. The creep then flung the woman to the pavement by her hair, before fleeing.
Lewis shared surveillance footage and described the encounter on social media just hours after the attack.
“As I’m walking with my headphones on listening to music, I feel something slap me so hard on my ass. So hard,” Lewis said in a video posted to TikTok on Monday.
“Right when I turned around, he grabbed my f—–g hair like this and yanked me and threw me to the ground. My headphones went f—–g flying. I was on the ground and I just saw him bolting down Waverly.”
NYU student assault pic.twitter.com/LxFhzmiafM
— Amelia Lewis (@AmeliaLewi33832) December 1, 2025
The student described the assault as “the scariest experience of my life.”
“I just really want to emphasize how not ok this is. I am a student at NYU,” Lewis said in another video posted to Twitter. “I should not be scared to be walking the street to go to my 9:30 am class. These people are disgusting, and they should not be able to walk around the street freely targeting girls.”
“He has done this to so many girls.”
Lewis said a friend of hers obtained footage of the attack from a nearby liquor store, which she provided to campus security at NYU.
“The university is deeply disturbed by the attack on one of its female students that took place yesterday morning on a Broadway sidewalk,” said NYU spokesman John Beckman. “We take this incident very seriously; we are offering support to the student, and NYU’s Campus Safety Department is working with the police in investigating the incident.”
Police took a man into custody in the wake of Monday’s assault on Lewis. No charges had been filed as of Tuesday evening, cops said.
