{"id":446431,"date":"2025-12-14T12:18:24","date_gmt":"2025-12-14T12:18:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/446431\/"},"modified":"2025-12-14T12:18:24","modified_gmt":"2025-12-14T12:18:24","slug":"kerri-aherne-accused-of-stabbing-mom-changing-baby-in-nyc-macys-cycled-through-psych-hospitals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/446431\/","title":{"rendered":"Kerri Aherne, accused of stabbing mom changing baby in NYC Macy’s, cycled through psych hospitals"},"content":{"rendered":"

The woman accused of knifing a mom changing her baby inside the Macy\u2019s Herald Square bathroom<\/a> had walked out of a mental institution in Massachusetts before ending up in a New York psych ward, where she stayed until the morning of the attack and hoped never to return, prosecutors said Saturday as more details were released on the violent, random assault.<\/p>\n

When questioned by police after Thursday\u2019s assault, Kerri Aherne<\/a> admitted she has spent most of her adult life in mental hospitals. During the summer of 2024, she walked out of her mental hospital in Massachusetts on a temporary leave pass and hopped an Uber to New York.<\/p>\n

\u201c(She) said she could not tolerate hospitals any longer and wanted to go to prison rather than be returned to a hospital,\u201d Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Paul Barker said at Aherne\u2019s arraignment late Friday.<\/p>\n

Aherne got her wish on Thursday when cops arrested her on two counts of attempted murder, assault, weapons possession and endangering the welfare of a child for repeatedly stabbing a 39-year-old tourist from California holiday shopping at Macy\u2019s Flagship store on Thursday afternoon.<\/p>\n

The Massachusetts native had purchased the kitchen knife at Macy\u2019s moments before the 3 p.m. attack in the seventh-floor public bathroom, officials said.<\/p>\n

The victim, a civilian employee for the Los Angeles County Sheriff\u2019s Department, was changing her 10-month-old baby girl when Aherne crept up behind her and attacked.<\/p>\n

The woman told police that she was focusing on her child when she felt a sharp pain in her back, a police source with knowledge of the case said. A moment later, she realized that Aherne had stabbed her.<\/p>\n

In a desperate attempt to protect her baby, she whirled around, confronted Aherne and grabbed the knife in the stranger\u2019s hand.<\/p>\n

She forced Aherne, 43, to the ground and subdued her as store security was called. During the close-quarters scuffle, the woman\u2019s child fell off the changing table, but only suffered a small bump to her head.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Macy’s flagship store is seen in New York’s Herald Square, Tuesday, May 11, 2021, in New York. (AP Photo\/Mary Altaffer)<\/p>\n

While it was first reported that the woman\u2019s husband, a Los Angeles County sheriff, had helped apprehend the attacker, cops said Saturday that he was in the store but didn\u2019t realize what had happened until the threat had ended.<\/p>\n

Aherne stabbed the woman twice in the back, cops said. EMS took the mom to Bellevue Hospital, where she needed stitches to close the wounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe is out of the hospital and she and the baby are in stable condition,\u201d the victim\u2019s cousin, who wished not to be named, told the Daily News Saturday.<\/p>\n

The victim\u2019s family still can\u2019t believe what happened, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey still have to process it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s traumatizing.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Friday, Aherne sat in a holding cell in Manhattan Criminal Court and \u201cdidn\u2019t say a word\u201d to anyone, a source with knowledge of the case said.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe didn\u2019t seem crazy at all,\u201d the source said.<\/p>\n

When she finally saw a judge, Aherne, who at times appeared confused, again reiterated that she didn\u2019t want to be re-hospitalized.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am what? What does that mean?\u201d Aherne asked when she was told she was being remanded to custody. \u201cI don\u2019t want to go to another hospital. They didn\u2019t help me at Manhattan Psychiatric Center.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aherne is facing up to 25 years in prison for the attack. Her attorney, Kevin Sylvan, declined to talk to reporters at her arraignment. A call to Sylvan on Saturday was not returned.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis city is a disaster,\u201d City Councilman Robert Holden (R-Queens) said on X<\/a> about the Macy\u2019s attack. \u201cProgressive social experiments gutted public safety and turned New York into a dumpster fire. Families should not live in fear. We need real leadership now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prosecutors said Aherne was arrested in her hometown of Tewksbury, Mass., back on June 23, 2018, for posting threats on Facebook about killing Sen. Elizabeth Warren<\/a>. She also said she was planning to get a gun and shoot someone at a local police station.<\/p>\n

After leaving the mental hospital in Massachusetts in summer 2024, Aherne was homeless in New York before shortly becoming a patient at the Manhattan Psychiatric Center on Wards Island, where prosecutors said she had been staying \u201cfor more than a year.\u201d<\/p>\n

She was discharged from the Manhattan Psychiatric Center on Thursday morning, just hours before the attack, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

After she wandered into Macy\u2019s, she bought the knife and looked for someone to kill, claiming that \u201cthe voices in her head told her she had to kill someone or she would be killed,\u201d Barker said.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately disclosed how Aherne ended in the Manhattan Psychiatric Center or why she was discharged. Repeated calls to the center, as well as to the New York State Office of Mental Health, were not returned Saturday.<\/p>\n

The NYPD said Aherne had never been arrested in New York City before Thursday\u2019s arrest. In her short time between hospital stays, no one had ever called 911 on the mentally ill woman, an NYPD spokeswoman said.<\/p>\n

When reached by phone, Aherne\u2019s relatives hung up on a Daily News reporter. Struggling with mental illness most of her life<\/a>, the Bay State native was declared an incapacitated person in the last decade and relatives were named her guardians, according to published reports citing court documents.<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s attack left shoppers at the 34th St. department store rattled, with some thinking twice of using the bathroom in the historic department store.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not use the seventh-floor bathroom because of that,\u201d Queens resident Oishe Tawhid told The News early Friday evening as she changed her 3-year-old\u2019s diaper in her baby carriage in the store\u2019s frigid entrance vestibule.<\/p>\n

A friend who works at the department store told Tawid, 27, about the attack. She usually likes to change her baby in the bathroom, but thought twice about it Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere should be more security, especially around the restrooms,\u201d she said. \u201cThis shouldn\u2019t happen to anyone. I feel so sorry for that lady.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are deeply saddened about the incident that took place today as the safety of our customers and colleagues is our top priority,\u201d a Macy\u2019s spokesman said in a statement. \u201cWe kindly defer any further questions to the local authorities.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The woman accused of knifing a mom changing her baby inside the Macy\u2019s Herald Square bathroom had walked…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":446432,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,2451,3059,5295,1370,728,405,403,5294,50,5226,5225,5228,5227,5293,5321,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-446431","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-city","10":"tag-county","11":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-local-news","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-city","16":"tag-new-york-county","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-newyork","19":"tag-newyorkcity","20":"tag-ny","21":"tag-nyc","22":"tag-nyc-crime","23":"tag-sub-county-region","24":"tag-united-states","25":"tag-united-states-of-america","26":"tag-unitedstates","27":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","28":"tag-us","29":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115717887940778231","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=446431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/446432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=446431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=446431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=446431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}