By Michelle Han
Minutes after passing a nearly illegible note to a subway token booth clerk Sunday, a 45-year-old Richmond Hill man jumped to his death in front of a J train in an apparent suicide, authorities said this week.
The man, Atma Singh of Jamaica Avenue, lived just down the street from the 111th Street subway station on Jamaica Avenue in Richmond Hill where he apparently took his own life, police said.
Singh was on the elevated platform, which runs above the busy Jamaica Avenue through Richmond Hill and Woodhaven, when he leapt into the path of an eastbound J train at about 11:45 a.m. Sunday, said Officer Charles Larkin, a police spokesman.
Authorities said the man had passed a suicide note to the token booth clerk, but the clerk did not take any action because the note was practically illegible.
Police asked the Queens district attorney's office whether the clerk was at fault in the man's death, but the DA's office found no wrongdoing in the incident.
“There was an investigation, but there appears to be no criminality on the part of the clerk,” said DA spokeswoman Sherry Hunter.
