Brooklyn synagogue car attack: First details emerge about suspect who sought 'guidance' from Jewish leaders

Details have emerged about a man who was taken into custody after repeatedly ramming his car into Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters Wednesday night.

Details have emerged about a man who was taken into custody after repeatedly ramming his car into a Brooklyn synagogue Wednesday night, January 28. Shocking video circulating on social media shows the Honda Sedan with New Jersey plates backing up and plowing into a side entrance of Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters at least four times during a holy celebration.

A man passes the Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File) (AP)

The suspect has been identified as a man who once sought “guidance” from Jewish leaders, the New York Post reported. He claimed that the incident with his car happened after his “it slipped.”

The NYPD is now investigating the incident as a possible hate crime, ABC 7 reported. Officers ordered the driver out of the vehicle and arrested him, but he has not been charged yet. NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch has said that the incident is being investigated by the Hate Crimes Task Force as a hate crime.

What we know about the suspect

Police responded to the Eastern Parkway building for a “motor vehicle collision” at about 8:45 pm and found that the car had crashed into the doors of a sloped driveway at the synagogue. A video shows the driver, who has not been publicly named yet, stepping out of the car and telling a Jewish man, “I dunno, it slipped! It slipped, you f–king a–hole!”

The driver told police that he suffered some type of mechanical issue. He made no terroristic statements after he was taken into custody, sources said, per the outlet.

Several witnesses told the outlet that the driver, who is the suspect, was lurking outside the Brooklyn Chabad before he rammed his car into the synagogue. They identified him as someone they had previously seen at other Chabad locations in New Jersey in recent months.

“He was always asking people for help. They called the police on him before,” one witness said.

One person said that they had seen the man at a Garden State synagogue in November “looking for spiritual guidance.” “He was very learned – he knew a lot about the Bible and Judaism. He was having a hard time with life,” they said.

One source alleged that the man was frequently dodgy about his connections with the Jewish faith. In different instances, he allegedly claimed that his mother was Jewish, then “pretended to be Jewish” himself.

Sources said that the driver went to a yeshiva in New Jersey on Tuesday, possibly trying to arrange a conversion, but was denied.

A 20-year-old student, Shlomo, said that before the alleged attack, the suspect was standing outside the Chabad in below-freezing weather wearing just shorts, a zipped-open hoodie, and a T-shirt. “He seemed a little not with it, you know, because it’s below zero over here, and he was wearing shorts and like a T-shirt, and open hoodie, and like just standing there, outside the synagogue for at least 15, 20 minutes,” he said.

The man was taken into custody after bystanders identified him as the driver.

Yaacov Behrman, the Chabad’s spokesperson, told the New York Post that the synagogue was packed with worshippers celebrating Yud Shevat, a holy day that marks the 75th anniversary of the current rebbe’s leadership. The event attracts thousands of congregants from around the world to the Crown Heights area.

The bomb squad unit responded to the scene and cleared the car. No explosives were found and no injuries reported.