Transit crime across New York City climbed nearly 11% in July, a jump police on Monday attributed in part to repeat offenders behind violent attacks and thefts in the subway system.
The NYPD recorded 173 transit crimes last month, up from 156 in July of last year, according to newly released department statistics.
Police officials said the rise was driven mainly by felony assaults and non-violent grand larcenies.
Felony assaults made up 27% of all transit crime in July, with 47 incidents reported, while grand larcenies — thefts involving property worth more than $1,000 — accounted for 51.4%, or 88 cases, officials said.
About half of those felony assaults targeted three groups of victims: NYPD officers, MTA workers and elderly riders, according to police officials.
Attacks on elderly subway riders represented nearly 21% of July’s felony assaults, with 10 incidents reported compared with four in the same month last year — a 150% increase, authorities said.
For the year to date, crime in the transit system is up 1%, an increase of 14 incidents overall, NYPD data shows.
Felony assaults over that same period rose 8.3%, amounting to 30 more attacks, according to the statistics.
Attacks on the elderly increased by 46.7%, or 66 assaults during 2026 so far compared to 45 last year, data shows. Assaults against NYPD cops and MTA employees largely stayed flat.
In a bright spot, unprovoked felony assaults went down 12.3%, data shows.
Law-enforcement sources argued recidivists — such as Joseph Zimmerman, 56, who has been arrested at least 50 times and previously highlighted in a February exposé by The Post — helped fuel many of those increases.
Zimmerman remains free despite a long criminal record, including an April arrest inside Broadway-Lafayette subway station, records show.
He was found sprawled out in the station, allegedly with a dollar bill coated in meth powder and a crack pipe with residue inside, sources said.
The career criminal also had an open grand larceny warrant for allegedly stealing a woman’s wallet at the Grand Street subway station in March, according to sources.
All of Zimmerman’s arrests this year were in the transit system, sources said.
Likewise, frequent offender Danny Rijos, 50, has been arrested 18 times in the transit system so far this year, sources said.
His fellow frequent flyer Elias Navarez — a 36-year-old with at least 42 arrests — allegedly assaulted several cops during a chaotic February arrest on a train car, sources said.
New York City Transit President Demetrius Crichlow called out the attacks on MTA employees in a statement to The Post.
“Transit employees should return home in the same condition they came to work. Attacks on public servants just trying to get New Yorkers where they need to go are unacceptable,” Crichlow said.
“As we’ve said repeatedly, when the NYPD catches the perpetrators, the justice system needs to do its part to deliver maximum consequences.”
— Additional reporting by Matthew Fischetti
