NEW YORK — A mumbling woman pushed a man to his death in front of a subway train on Thursday night, the second time this month someone has been killed in such nightmarish fashion, police said. The man, who wasn't immediately identified, was standing on the elevated platform of a 7 train in the borough of Queens at about 8 p.m. when he was shoved by the woman, who witnesses said had been following him closely and mumbling to herself, New York Police Department chief spokesman Paul Browne said. It didn't appear the man noticed her before he was shoved onto the tracks, police said. The woman fled, and police were searching for her. She was described as Hispanic, in her 20s, heavyset and about 5-foot-5, wearing a blue, white and gray ski jacket and Nike sneakers with gray on top and red on the bottom. It was unclear if the man and the woman knew each other or if anyone tried to help the man up before he was struck by the train and killed. On Dec. 3, 58-year-old Ki-Suck Han was shoved in front of a train in Times Square. A photograph of him on the tracks a split second before he was killed was published on the front of the New York Post the next day, causing an uproar and debate over whether the photographer, who had been waiting for a train, should have tried to help him and whether the newspaper should have run the image. Apparently no one else tried to help up Han, either. A homeless man, 30-year-old Naeem Davis, was charged with murder in Han's death and was ordered held without bail. He has pleaded not guilty and has said that Han was the aggressor and had attacked him first. The two men hadn't met before. Service was suspended Thursday night on the 7 train line, which connects Manhattan and Queens, and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority was using buses to shuttle riders while police investigated. Being pushed onto the train tracks is a silent fear for many of the commuters who ride the city's subway a total of more than 5.2 million times on an average weekday, but deaths are rare. Among the more high-profile cases was the January 1999 death of aspiring screenwriter Kendra Webdale, who was shoved by a former mental patient. After that, the state Legislature passed Kendra's Law, which lets mental health authorities supervise patients who live outside institutions to make sure they are taking their medications and aren't threats to safety. 3 New Jersey police officers shot Three police officers in New Jersey were shot early on Friday, and one is in surgery for his wounds, a hospital official said. The three officers, two men and a woman, were brought to Cooper University Hospital shortly after 6 a.m. EST (1100 GMT), hospital spokeswoman Lori Shaffer said. Two of the officers suffered minor wounds, but one of the three, a male, required surgery, Shaffer said. She had no more information on the extent of the officer's wounds. The shooting took place at the Gloucester Township Police station, about 16 miles outside of Philadelphia, according to Philadelphia TV station NBC10. Gloucester Township Police would provide no details about the incident. “You're going to have to wait for a press release,” a person answering the telephone at the police department said. The incident is the latest multiple shooting in the United States, and comes two weeks after a gunman killed 26 people, including 20 children, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. One week ago in western Pennsylvania, a man with a pistol fatally shot three people and then opened fire on police. Three officers were injured in that incident, one in a collision from a car chase with the gunman, another from bullet fragments to the face and a third who was struck with gunfire to the chest but survived because he was wearing a bulletproof vest. — Reuters
