Several women have come forward on social media recently claiming they’ve been punched in the face or the head by strangers while walking in New York City.
Within the last 10 days, several young, female victims have posted on TikTok about the terrifying moments when they were approached by strangers and hit.
TikTok user Olivia Brand, for example, uploaded a video on March 17 after she was “punched by some man on the sidewalk.”
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“He goes, ‘Sorry!’ And then punches me in the head,” she recalled.
“Holy f—! What the hell just happened?” she wrote.
The Empire State Building is seen along the Manhattan skyline in New York City on July 24, 2023. (ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)
Social media influencer Halley Kate, who has 1.1 million TikTok followers, posted a video of herself in a hysterical state after she experienced a similar hit to the head.
“I was literally just walking, and a man came up and punched me in the face,” she said through tears.
The TikToker (@halleykate) showed off a golf-ball sized bump on the right side of her head near her hairline.
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“It hurts so bad, I can’t even talk,” she said.
“I fell to the ground and now this giant goose egg is forming.”
The video currently has more than three million likes and 30 million views.
She followed up with multiple updates on the app, going into more detail in other videos.
Halley Kate attends an event with Teen Vogue and motorola razr at Moxy Chelsea on Sept. 28, 2022, in New York City. (Arturo Holmes/Getty Images for Teen Vogue)
At the time of the assault, Kate said she had been looking down at her phone when she was either “punched or elbowed” by a man, who was also walking a dog.
“I think he was just really mad that my head was down,” she said. “So, he took it upon himself to body-check me and let me know to be conscious of my surroundings.”
After she fell to the ground, she said she “blacked out for a second” and regained consciousness to find the man standing over her and “screaming” at her.
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The content creator said she fled the scene out of fear — later visiting an urgent care facility to get her injuries assessed.
“The doctor told me that I seem[ed] OK, just to watch out for signs of vomiting or vision loss,” she said. “I think I’m completely fine.”
She also said that she’d spoken with the New York Police Department (NYPD) and they are “looking into it.”
“I think he was just really mad that my head was down,” one victim said. (iStock)
Another NYC woman, Mikayla Toninato, posted a video to TikTok shortly afterward, claiming that she was also “punched in the face” when leaving class.
The Parsons School of Design student shared that she “turned the corner” while looking down at her phone texting — and was met by a man who decided to hit her.
“I’m like actually in shock right now,” she said, with a noticeable bruise forming underneath her left eye.
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“I don’t know if this is like a thing that’s going around, but I guess if you’re in New York right now and you’re walking while looking at your phone, maybe don’t do that.”
She added, “I guess we’re going to be super aware of our surroundings.”
Toninato posted an update in a follow-up video, detailing that she “didn’t see him coming.”
Exterior of The New School, part of Parsons School of Design, in New York City. A student shared recently that she “turned the corner” while looking down at her phone texting — and was met by a man who decided to hit her. (iStock)
“My head was just clocked back, turned around, and I saw him looking at me walking away,” she said.
“So many girls have reached out to me saying that this exact same story happened to them.”
Toninato assumed that there are “multiple men going around doing this,” noting that the man who hit her was a “Black male definitely over six feet tall.”
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“He had dreads that, like, didn’t quite go to his shoulder,” she described in her video.
According to the police officer who assisted Toninato after the attack, there is a “meth rehabilitation center” located next to her school building in Union Square.
“They see stuff like this happen every single day because of the people that are just hanging out around the rehab center,” she said.
Police officers at the Union Square Train Station in Manhattan on Saturday, June 17, 2023. (Theodore Parisienne for NY Daily News via Getty Images)
After a visit to the emergency room on March 26, Toninato was told she had a concussion.
“We officially have a concussion, a black eye and a chipped tooth,” she said.
The women’s videos have gone viral on the app, with many users showing concern for safety in NYC’s streets.
Police reports filed
The NYPD confirmed to Fox News Digital that there had been at least two reports filed of this nature.
One report on file for harassment occurred on Sunday, March 17, when a 25-year-old female was walking her dog in the vicinity of Kenmare Street and Mulberry Street when she was punched in the head by a stranger.
The NYPD shared two reports of similar incidents in March 2024. (iStock)
No injuries were reported as a result, according to the police.
On Monday, March 25, another report was filed by a 23-year-old woman for assault while walking in the vicinity of West 16th Street and 7th Avenue.
The woman claimed in the report that an unknown individual hit her in the head, and she fell to the ground.
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She suffered injuries to the left side of her face, according to the report, and was treated at a local medical facility.
A spokesperson for the Deputy Commissioner for Public Information (DCPI) on Wednesday told Fox News Digital that there has been one arrest in the March 25 case, that the individual arrested has been charged with assault — and that the investigation “remains ongoing.”
Referring to both cases, “it is unclear if these incidents are connected at this time,” a spokesperson also said.
People walk down a shopping street in Manhattan on Oct. 26, 2022, in New York City. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
Encouraging awareness
The women who experienced these incidents of assault urged other women to stay safe and stay aware.
Halley Kate, who’s lived in NYC for six years, shared in one of her videos that she believes these incidents were isolated cases, and that assaults of this kind are “a somewhat common thing that happens in big cities.”
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“While it’s obviously really upsetting and disgusting that women have to deal with s— like this, I personally am not going to revolve my life around that one incident,” she said.
“I do think this is a good wake-up call just to be a little more aware of my surroundings – and that’s not just in New York City, literally anywhere in the world.”
A city street scene on the left, and on the right, Halley Kate on Sept. 28, 2022, in New York City. (iStock; Arturo Holmes/Getty Images for Teen Vogue)
She added, “Ladies, we’re not going to live our life in fear, but we are going to be cautious. We are going to be aware.”
Fox News Digital reached out to all of the women mentioned on TikTok for further comment and updates.
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