Police from the 112th Precinct in Forest Hills are looking for a groper who targeted a woman riding on a bus in Woodhaven during the evening of Tuesday, Aug. 5.
The 28-year-old victim was aboard a Q53 MTA bus on Woodhaven Boulevard approaching Myrtle Avenue and Forest Park at 5:45 p.m. when a stranger allegedly stood behind her and forcibly grabbed her rear end, police said Thursday. The creep remained on the bus for more than a mile and a half when he exited the bus at the Penelope Avenue stop in Middle Village and fled on foot in an unknown direction. The woman was not injured during the encounter.
The NYPD released a surveillance image of the suspect and requested the public’s help in identifying him.
He is described as having a light complexion with short gray hair with a beard and mustache and he wore a dark-colored button-down shirt, light-colored pants and a dark-colored baseball cap.
Anyone with information regarding this forcible touching investigation is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime Stoppers website at crimestoppers.nypdonline.org or on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) @NYPDTips. All calls and messages are confidential.
Through Aug. 3, the 112th Precinct has reported 24 sex crimes so far in 2025, four more than the 20 reported at the same point last year, an increase of 20%, according to the most recent CompStat report. Transit crimes are down in the precinct with 19 reported so far this year, four fewer than the 23 reported at the same point in 2024, a decline of 17.4%, according to CompStat.
