A career criminal out on parole was busted for callously shoving a 91-year-old man during a botched robbery on the Upper East Side that left the victim hospitalized, authorities said.
Christian Torres, 35, was stepping off a No. 6 train in East Harlem when he was nabbed by eagle-eyed patrol cops who recognized him from a “Wanted” poster for the Feb. 1 attack, the NYPD said.
The bully allegedly shoved Hyman Silverglad to the ground on East 86th Street near First Avenue in a brazen broad-daylight attack, but he scurried off when Silverglad screamed for help, officials said.
Torres – who cops say has multiple prior arrests – was charged with attempted robbery in the failed robbery that left Silverglad with six bone fractures and another fracture at the bottom of his spine.
Torres pounced on Silverglad around 10:30 a.m., unloading punches as he tried to grab the nonagenarian’s wallet, police said.
But the assailant ran off empty-handed when the elderly victim shouted and tried to fight back, according to Silverglad and cops.
“I cough and I’m almost dead,” Silverglad told The Post in a hospital interview last week. “I tell you if I was young I would run after this mother-freaker and beat the shoot out of him and kick his ass and he’ll forget being a criminal.
“Some people use lead pipes, I don’t go so far,” he added.
Silverglad — who is battling cancer and kidney failure — told The Post he was returning from the store with some groceries when his attacker jumped him.
He was on the ground yelling for help because he couldn’t get up — but nobody stopped, he said.
“You think I was hit by a mortar shell on a battlefield. It was so agonizing. No one stopped. No one even looked at me,” he said. “They just walked … because New York City is racing to a non-civilized area.”
As he tried to crawl back to his apartment building, three women walking towards the same entrance — whom he called “God‘s angels without wings” — helped carry Silverglad to his bed.
The mugging has left him ready to leave the Big Apple for good.
“New York City has morphed into a jungle. Since my assault, I’m thinking of moving from New York City to a safe place,” he said, naming Texas or Israel as safer destinations.
“No person over 65 is safe in this city,” Silverglad added. “Those under 65 have some safety in their health and the ability to run.”
This wasn’t Torres’ first attempted robbery bust – he was locked up in state prison from January 2022-April 2023 for a Bronx conviction on the same charge, state corrections records show. He was on post-supervision release at the time of the alleged attempted robbery on Silverglad.
He also served time on a Brooklyn criminal sale of a controlled substance conviction between 2005 and 2008, according to the records.
His earliest prison sentence was in 1998 on an arson and robbery conviction in the Bronx. He remained behind bars until 2004 following that conviction, records show.