A registered sex offender was arrested and charged with a hate crime for threatening a Jewish student and chasing him down a Brooklyn street with a knife while shouting, “Heil Hitler!” cops said on Thursday.
Devin Best, 48, was arrested and charged with aggravated harassment as a hate crime and menacing after cursing at the 24-year-old victim and chasing him with a knife down Park Place near New York Ave. in Crown Heights while yelling the Nazi salute on Wednesday around 2:48 a.m., according to police.
The victim can be seen running full speed away from a man chasing him down with a knife before escaping into a building in a harrowing video taken from a surveillance camera, posted on X by Crown Heights Shmira. The man then menacingly points his knife at the building’s front door for several seconds and seethes, “Now I know where you live! That’s what I wanted! Heil f—in’ Hitler!”
He also spews an anti-Black racial slur at the victim, who is white, plus two derogatory sexist slurs.
The man then appears to stab and slash the tires of a bicycle in front of the building before storming off, the video shows.
The victim, who can be seen in the video wearing a tallit, or Jewish prayer shawl, and yarmulke, is identified as a “bochur,” or Yeshiva student, by Crown Heights Shmira, a neighborhood volunteer patrol.
Best, a Bronx resident, has been arrested nine times in New York, including three times for sex crimes. He was busted for rape in 1998 and had two arrests just days apart in May 1999, including one for sexual abuse and another for aggravated sexual abuse.
He is listed as a level three sex offender on the NY State Sex Offender Registry, indicating he is at the highest risk of re-offending.
Later that day, another man was arrested for a pair of unprovoked assaults, including a senseless attack on a 66-year-old Rabbi, cops said.
The suspect ambushed the rabbi on Dahill Road near Cortelyou Road in Borough Park, repeatedly punching him and placing him in a headlock around 9:30 p.m., cops said.
Medics took the victim to Maimonides Medical Center for treatment.
Cops arrested Eric Avrutov, 31, and charged him with assault, criminal obstruction of breathing and harassment.
The assault on the rabbi is not being investigated as a hate crime, cops said.
About 10 minutes before the attack on the rabbi, Avrutov slugged a 60-year-old man in the face at a gas station less than 200 feet away.
That man refused medical attention, and Avrutov was charged with assault and harassment for the attack.
“Last night, a Rabbi was attacked in Boro Park and a Yeshiva student was chased by a knife-wielding man screaming “Heil Hitler” in Crown Heights,” Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso posted on X on Thursday.
“I’m appalled by these horrific antisemitic acts. Brooklyn must be safe for all — we cannot tolerate attacks on our Jewish neighbors,” Reynoso wrote.
The number of hate crimes in the five boroughs has increased by 15% so far this year compared to this point last year, with 58 additional confirmed incidents, according to NYPD statistics. Of the 45 confirmed hate crimes in August, 19, or 42%, were antisemitic incidents.