Homeless man charged with pushing woman onto Manhattan subway tracks after following her into train station

A homeless person was accused of pushing a woman onto the train tracks in the Manhattan subway in front of City Hall, who had targeted the victim by following her until she pushed her, prosecutors said.

Identified as 41-year-old Samuel Junker, he was filmed by security camera following 34-year-old Xu Yanan from the Chambers St. station turnstiles to platform 1/2/3 around 11:00 a.m. Tuesday night before he pushed her to the bottom railing, court documents say.

“His sole objective when he entered the subway station was to push the victim onto the tracks and then immediately escape,” Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Madeline Holbrook explained during Junker’s arraignment, where the arrest was ordered. Arrest of the alleged perpetrator of the subway push on a $250,000 bail.

After the push, Yanan broke his leg. Other New York subway commuters helped the woman onto the platform before the train arrived at the station.

Junker, who was a resident of a homeless shelter in White Plains, was arrested in TriBeca on Thursday after they were caught acting erratically on Broadway near Lispernard Street.

The shooter was taken to Bellevue Hospital for evaluation, but authorities quickly recognized him as the wanted subject in Tuesday’s crime, the Daily News reported.

The man was dressed in a tattered red shirt, jeans and non-braided work boots at the time of the attack, prosecutors said.

The assistant prosecutor told detectives that they were trying to determine whether the evidence “supports higher charges,” including hate crime charges.

Station security cameras captured Junker going in and out of the Manhattan train station, prosecutors said.

“(He) proceeded down the stairs, accelerating, to follow (his victim),” the criminal complaint against Junker states.

Prior to Tuesday’s push, the suspect was arrested twice in White Plains over the summer for criminal mischief and trespassing.

He was arrested for trespassing on August 20, a week before the crime against Yanan, prosecutors said.

Junker has no convictions in New York, but he does have several in Georgia, where he was arrested multiple times for criminal misconduct and “exposure of sexual organs,” prosecutors said.

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