Community stunned as identities of Times Square stabbing victims, attacker made public
A senseless moment in one of New York’s busiest areas claimed the life of a 32-year-old woman who had just returned to work from maternity leave. Questions about mental health support and more persisted regarding the woman who committed the attack, given her prior history with the New York Police Department.
A day after New York City was stunned when a 32-year-old Bank of America executive was one of two people stabbed during a random act of violence, the identities of the victims and the perpetrator have been revealed.
On Monday, 32-year-old Erin Piacenti was walking through Times Square following her first day back from maternity leave. A vice president at Bank of America, Piacenti had given birth to her first child, a baby girl, five months prior. Her joy of returning to work, embracing motherhood and more turned tragic when 49-year-old Pamela Cisneros randomly stabbed her in the abdomen. Piacenti was later taken to the hospital where she later died.
Cisneros, who stabbed another person, 68-year-old Tak Kam, moments prior, was later shot and killed by NYPD officers. The entire incident was captured on video. According to police commissioner Jessica Tisch, Cisneros had prior run-ins with officers, once after seeming beliigerent in 2018 and then in 2019 after she attempted to jump in front of a train at the Kew Gardens-Union Turnpike subway station in Queens.
Bank of America issued a statement following Piacenti’s death.
“We are shocked and deeply saddened by the tragic loss of our colleague,” the company said. “She was a valued teammate who will be greatly missed. Our hearts go out to her family and all of her loved ones.”
For decades, according to her father, Cisneros struggled with her mental health, with her most prominent episode occurring in 2019 when she tried to jump in front of a train.
“We tried to help her in every way possible,” Cisneros’ father, Mario, told The New York Times. According to him, Cisneros no longer required him to take her to regular mental health appointments, saying that she could do it on her own. She had turned a corner, he thought.
“What she did just doesn’t make sense,” he said after learning of her stabbing two people. “It just doesn’t fit. I am so sorry, as her father. Nobody should take a life. Not God, not a human being. Nobody.”