The teenager’s family told Eyewitness News reporter Jim Dolan that he was not there at the time of the incident and did not participate.
Police on Friday arrested and charged a 17-year-old man for the crimes, which damaged a BMW and a taxi and left its occupants shaken.
The incident was reported on Tuesday just after 4 pm at the intersection between East 21st Street and Fifth Avenue, and on Thursday, a group of teenagers surrounded and broke into two cars.
One of the teenagers allegedly kicked the BMW SUV while a large group surrounded him.
The parents of the previously accused teenager said he had an alibi and was at the Queens Center Mall buying a gift for his brother at the time of the incident.
His brother and father showed a receipt during the incident, as well as what they said were screenshots from his mobile phone tracking applications.
“It’s absolutely unacceptable,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio. “You have these teenagers doing something wrong, period. At least one has been arrested, the others will be. Look, we need to teach our young people better all the time. It’s up to us all. But we must also have consequences. So there will be consequences in this case. I don’t want to see anything like this in New York again. “
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Police are looking for up to four teenagers clearly caught in the video throwing a bicycle on the hood of the car, jumping on the windshield and hitting his collar nine times.
Detectives are working on possible identification of at least two of these suspects and several arrests are expected.
It is estimated that up to 25 cyclists were part of the group surrounding the BMW and previously a yellow taxi on East 29th Street and Fifth Avenue.
Lawyer Teny Geragos recorded the video and said he assisted many others in doing the same.
“Suddenly, I heard loud screams and bangs,” she said. “I ran from the conference table to the window to see what the hustle and bustle was. I saw dozens and dozens of cyclists hitting, touring, hitting bikes against the taxi driver, the taxi driver’s cab.”
She pleads with anyone who has videos of these incidents to turn them over to the police.
“There were too many, too many of them, and they were hitting his window one by one,” she said. “Later, they completely wiped the mirrors off his car and then a motorcyclist even hit him.”
She said she was shocked.
“I was horrified to see her now and to know what had happened to other people,” she said. “It was terrifying. It was almost unbelievable because it was like nothing I had ever witnessed in the city. I was just praying that everything would be all right.
The 36-year-old BMW driver, “Max Torgovnic, was with his mother while the scene unfolded. He said he still couldn’t get over the shock of this happening on Fifth Avenue in broad daylight – and he feared both his life and that of his mother.
“And I noticed this swarm of cyclists, tall and young children just coming in and out of traffic and kind of going around the car,” he said. “I got to the point where they were in front of me and they were on either side of me and behind me and I was probably going like seven or eight miles an hour.”
Torgovnic said the children were holding on to the door handles. He said his first instinct was to slow down, stop, and let him pass.
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He said he did not see her, but a witness told her that someone was behind the vehicle on a bicycle doing a wheelie. And when he slowed down, the motorcyclist apparently crashed into the back of the car.
Torgovnic says this prompted the attack, which was caught with the camera. He said he stopped when he heard the bang to make sure everyone was okay.
“I started to open the driver’s door, but I was immediately surrounded on all sides by these children who just got off the bike and started screaming, screaming, punching the car, hitting the hood of the car, just screaming “Get out, get out, open the roller on the window, run on the window,” he said. “When I didn’t, they started attacking the car itself.”
Anyone with information is asked to call the NYPD crime helpline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-TRACK (74782).
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