The victim of a seemingly random subway stabbing, described by a friend as a hardworking restaurant employee from Manhattan, was attacked while returning home after a long shift, the friend shared on Tuesday.

Roberto Gaspar, 25, was engrossed in his phone when a stranger suddenly assaulted him from behind on a No. 7 train at the 111th Street station in Corona, Queens, on Sunday night, according to his friend and police details.

The unknown assailant, who was photographed smiling widely in a surveillance image, used an “unknown sharp object” to stab Gaspar once in the neck and twice in the back, authorities reported.

Gaspar was transported to New York Presbyterian/Queens Hospital, where his friend Tomas Calel, 35, informed The Post that Gaspar is now on a ventilator and unable to communicate.

“He is serious. He can’t talk,” Calel said in Spanish outside the victim’s Queens apartment building. “He’s in the ICU. He’s hooked up to machines.

“The doctors say maybe he’ll talk, maybe. We are hoping he recovers and will be able to talk.

“I feel bad for him,” Calel said. “He didn’t see anything. He doesn’t know who did it.”

Originally hailing from Guatemala, Gaspar has been residing in the US for seven or eight years, diligently working and sending money to his family back home, according to his friend. He has four sisters, one of whom also resides in the city, Calel noted.

Gaspar generally works 10-hour shifts five days a week at a restaurant in Manhattan, undertaking a wide range of duties from cooking to cleaning and dishwashing. He often adds a sixth working day during peak periods to send financial support back to his parents and three additional sisters, Calel explained.

Gaspar takes the train to and from work and was headed home when the incident happened, according to Calel. 

“I’m angry. He didn’t do anything wrong,” Calel said. “I believe [the attacker] is a bad guy. Why did he do that? I want them to catch this guy.

“He’s laughing,” Calel added as he looked at the image of the gleeful suspect. “He doesn’t care what he did to my friend.”

He described his badly injured buddy as “a quiet guy” who “doesn’t make trouble” and simply goes home to sleep after his long work days. 

Calel said he plans to visit Gaspar in the hospital, where the victim’s sister – who is “crying a lot” and “scared” – was already gathered with her husband. 

Calel, who works at a different Manhattan restaurant, said he is now afraid to ride the train at night. 

“Sometimes I go [to work] by train, sometimes I go by bike. I take the train at nights, I come home at 10 at nights,” he said. “I’m afraid to take the train now because what happened to my friend could happen to me, too.”

Anyone with information on the assault is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).

The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime Stoppers website at or on X @NYPDTips.