A tough Big Apple woman bravely fought back against a sicko who pummeled her and tried to rape her during a bloody attack on an Upper West Side street on the Fourth of July, police said Thursday.
The victim, 37, was left with a fractured skull following the horrific violent assault that happened moments after she got out of an Uber near Central Park, cop sources said.
The suspect – identified as Desmond Smith, 32 – who lives in a single room occupancy building on West 83rd street near Columbus, was arrested on Thursday afternoon, law enforcement sources said.
The woman was headed home at around 11 p.m. Wednesday when the approximately 200-pound, 6-foot thug followed her and tried to engage her in a conversation as she was on West 84th Street near Central Park West, police said.
When she ignored his advances, the creep threw her to the sidewalk and punched, stomped and even bit her about her face and her head, cops said.
“He tells her that he’s going to rape her,” a high-ranking police source told The Post.
The depraved criminal then ripped the woman’s pants off, and she bit his hand.
A doorman heard the struggle and intervened.
“I was standing at my desk, I heard this female screaming, so I come out to see what’s going on,” doorman Ernest Pjetri, a 40-year-old father of four, told The Post.
Desmond Smith is transported from the Manhattan Special Victims Precinct in New York.Christopher Sadowski“I look by the pump (fire hydrant) and I saw this guy on top of this girl, hitting her, pulling her hair, pulling her clothes.”
Pjetri said he took out my phone and tried to record the attack.
“I push the button to record but somehow it came out and make a picture,” he said.
“And when I make a picture the flashlight came on, so he saw the flashlight and he left her, so he was coming towards me. I told him to, `Stay away from me,’ he said, `No picture!’ ”
Pjetri said the perp briefly chased him and shoved in the back, before fleeing. Pjetri safely retreated back into his building and called cops.
The woman then “runs into the building and she leaves her clothing in the street,” one source said.
The woman was taken to Lenox Hill Hospital across the park, on the Upper East Side.
“He beat her pretty bad — a fractured skull and eye socket. If that doorman hadn’t come along, this guy would have finished what he started,” the source said.
Sources say there were four 911 calls made during the terrifying incident to report that a woman was being assaulted.
Meanwhile, Upper West Side residents were left shaken by the attack.
“I find that really shocking because this is generally a pretty safe area,” said one West 83rd Street resident who did not want to give her name. “I’m really surprised something like that would happen so close to home.”
Sarah McLoughlin, 49, who has lived in the area for 14 years, agreed.
“I have little girls and some of them are in middle school, so that’s really scary,” she said. “I feel like most people feel very safe around here.”
Additional reporting by Katherine Lavacca, Gina Daidone and Larry Celona
