Transit officials have “turned their back on safety,” according a commuter who was shoved into an onrushing subway train by an unhinged stranger in Times Square.

Lenny Javier, 43, of New Jersey, was waiting for a northbound 3 train in October 2021, when Anthonia Egegbara leapt off a bench behind her and pushed her into the moving train as it rolled into the station, video of the unprovoked incident shows.

“I never thought it would happen to me,” Javier, who suffered a fractured chin and nose, said at the time.

Now Javier is suing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and NYC Transit in Manhattan Federal Court, alleging the agencies have been aware for decades that riders aren’t safe and have done nothing to protect them from the “known problem” of the violent mentally ill.

The agencies “chose to ignore its obligation to the public … and they have turned their back on safety” and continue to “allow families and lives to be destroyed, despite having … available means to eliminate or greatly reduce the danger,” she alleged in the legal filing.

Last year, 29 people were pushed onto the subway tracks, the NYPD said, a 45% increase from 2019 when 20 riders shoved.

Javier’s terrifying ordeal came three months before Michelle Go, an Upper West Sider and exec at consulting firm Deloitte, was killed in January 2022 after being pushed onto the subway tracks by a mentally ill man in Times Square.

Egegbara, 29, was arrested and charged with attempted murder in Javier’s attack but is being held in a psychiatric facility until authorities determine whether she’s fit to stand trial, according to the Manhattan DA.

Egegbara had done it before, allegedly beating straphanger Jasmine Robles of Brooklyn in July 2021. Robles lost a tooth. Egegbara was charged with a misdemeanor, but the case was dropped when she was found unfit, a DA spokeswoman said.

Javier’s suit also calls on transit officials to install platform barriers and slowing trains as they enter stations.

She claims transit officials have ignored such solutions despite more than 100 people seriously hurt each year after either falling onto the tracks or coming into contact with moving trains, and “more than 30 years of statistics.”

Other cities, including Tokyo, Paris, London, Hong Kong, have platform barriers in at least some stations. In New York, such barriers are only on the AirTrain.

The MTA is in the midst of seeking contractors for a pilot program that would install the barriers in three stations: the 7 train stop at Times Square-42nd Street; the E train at Sutphin Boulevard-Archer Avenue in Queens and the L train at the 3rd Avenue station in Manhattan.

“There is no safety in New York City transit,” insisted advocate Charlton D’souza, head of the group Passengers United, adding he supports Javier’s lawsuit. “I just hope this lawsuit will wake them up.

“Elected officials don’t care. After Michelle Go died, promises were made that when they came to her memorial they would fix things. Nothing’s been done. It’s disgraceful. I’m just outraged and appalled,” he said.

Nicole Gelinas, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute who writes about urban economics and finance, said subway safety isn’t all about physical solutions such as platform barriers, noting that cities around the world which have them also “have zero tolerance for the behavior we tolerate in the subway system.

“The standard of service is not really the platform doors, but, what do you allow in your subway system?” she said. “Should you have the expectation of safety when you’re standing there, after you pay your fare? It would seem that you should.”

An MTA spokesman said the Authority “recognizes how essential safety is to customers.”

“We appreciate the surge of NYPD officers into the subway system as well as the broader ‘Cops, Cameras, Care’ initiative, which has increased the safety of riders and helped those experiencing serious mental health issues get the assistance they need outside of the subway system,” spokesman Sean Butler said in a statement.

Number of times people were pushed onto subway tracks in NYC

2022: 29

2021: 30

2020: 26

2019: 20

Source: NYPD