Brooklyn subway shooting suspect Frank James arrested in NYC
New York City police on Wednesday arrested Frank James, the suspect in the mass shooting that occurred on a crowded subway train in Brooklyn the day before, after police say he called them to reveal his location.
James, 62, was taken into custody in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan without incident, police said.
At a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, New York City Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said James was stopped on the street by two officers in response to a tip that police received on their Crime Stoppers hotline. He was arrested and transported to an NYPD facility, where he will be processed.
“We used every resource at our disposal,” Sewell said. “We were able to shrink his world quickly. There was nowhere for him left to run.”
Breon Peace, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said James will be arraigned in Brooklyn Federal Court and charged with several crimes, including terrorism against a mass transit system, a federal offense. He faces up to life in prison if found guilty.
James was initially identified by police as a “person of interest” and then formally as a suspect after keys from a U-Haul van that he had rented in Philadelphia were found in the subway following Tuesday morning’s attack.
“My fellow New Yorkers, we got him. We got him,” Mayor Eric Adams said via video from Gracie Mansion, his official residence, where he has been isolating after testing positive for COVID-19. “Less than 30 hours later, we’re able to say we got him.”
Earlier Wednesday, the NYPD released new photos of James, including stills from surveillance cameras outside the 36th Street subway station in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, where the shooting occurred.
A $50,000 reward had been offered to find James, who police said had addresses in Wisconsin and Philadelphia.
NYPD Chief of Detectives James Essig said James was known to police and had an extensive arrest history that included nine prior arrests, dating from 1992 to 1998, ranging from burglary and criminal sex acts to trespassing and disorderly conduct. But he had no prior felony convictions and was not known to the FBI.
Witnesses to Tuesday’s shooting told police that as the train was pulling into the 36th Street station, James donned what appeared to be a gas mask, took two canisters out of his bag and opened them, filling the car with smoke. He then brandished a 9-mm handgun, firing it at least 33 times. Ten people were shot and an additional 13 people were injured in the chaos that followed. All are expected to survive.
Essig said that James then boarded an R train, traveled one stop and exited at 25th Street.
Police recovered a handgun, three magazines, two detonated smoke grenades, two nondetonated smoke grenades, a hatchet, gasoline and the U-Haul keys at the scene.
The gun was purchased legally by James in Ohio in 2011, Essig said.
While there is no known motive, a YouTube channel that appeared to belong to James contains numerous videos in which he ranted about gun violence and mass shootings as well as race issues. In one video uploaded on Monday, he said he had thought about killing people. In another, he discussed a plan announced by Adams and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to protect people on the city’s subway system.
“Their plan is doomed for failure,” James said.
Tuesday's attack came amid a rise in violent crime in New York, particularly on its transit system. Since the beginning of 2022, there have been 375 transit crimes, a jump of nearly 73% compared with the same period in 2021, according to the NYPD.
"I'm committing the full resources of our state to fight this scourge of crime, this insanity that is seizing our cities," Hochul said at press conference hours after the shooting. "Because we want to get back to normal."
