The number of reported hate crimes in the subway system has spiked in 2016, according to NYPD data.
There have been 37 reported hate crimes in the subway this year as of Dec. 12, an increase from 19 reported incidents last year, the data show.
Topping the list were 12 reported attacks targeting subway riders’ sexual orientation. There were also eight anti-Semitic hate crimes reported.
Police will begin packaging the statistics in the crime briefing presented to the MTA’s New York City Transit and Bus Committee each month. The briefing currently includes data on incidents like murders, rapes and assaults that have occurred in the subway and bus networks.
There were more than 1,400 incidents of grand larceny documented in the subway and bus systems so far this year, as well as 280 felony assaults and 434 robberies, according to NYPD data through November.
Last month, Gov. Andrew Cuomo set up a discrimination hotline to combat the uptick in hate crimes documented citywide since Donald Trump was elected president.
“There is no place for racism, there is no place for hate, there is no place for swastikas, there is no place for racially-inflammatory and divisive rhetoric or acts,” Cuomo said at the time. “This is New York. This is America. We are all immigrants and the way this state and this country works is we are a diverse population.”
On Wednesday, it was revealed that a Muslim woman who said she had her hijab nearly ripped off by Donald Trump supporters on the subway lied about the attack, according to police. That incident was excluded from the data.
