White NYC hospital worker is accused of trying to steal a Citi Bike from black man
A white hospital worker in New York City is accused of stealing a Citi Bike from a black man who had already paid for it.
In a now-viral video, the female hospital worker — dressed in blue scrubs that read “NYC Health + Hospitals” — was seen screaming for help and accusing a black man of assault, even breaking down in tears as a crowd gathered around her.
But the man’s friends say in the video that he was the one who bought the rental bike, and say she is trying to steal it from him.
The video has caught the attention of famed civil rights lawyer Ben Crump, who tweeted that the Bellevue Hospital employee was “roughly trying to weaponize her tears to portray this man as a threat.”
“This is EXACTLY the kind of behavior that has put so many black men at risk in the past!” he wrote on Sunday.
It remains unclear what happened prior to the 30-second video and Bellevue Hospital says it is now investigating the incident.
A viral video claims to show a white woman trying to steal a Citi Bike from a black man who had already paid for it
The video featured the unidentified Bellevue Hospital employee screaming for help
The video, posted to TikTok and Twitter, shows an unidentified woman arguing with a black man outside New York City’s Bellevue Hospital over the weekend near a Citi bike rack.
One of the men’s friends tells the woman that he is recording the situation while the black man has his hand on the bicycle.
The woman then screams for help, saying, “Help! Help me! Please help me!’
But the man’s friend, off screen, tells her, “This isn’t your bike.”
The hospital worker then yells for help again, asking the black man to “please get out.”
She then takes off her hospital badge in an apparent attempt to hide her identity, as one of the men could be heard asking her, “You know you’re not getting this bike?”
The woman only screams for help again and tries to get on the rental bike, before swiping the black man’s phone.
“Why are you taking his phone?” one of the man’s friends asks the woman. ‘What is wrong with you?
“Don’t touch his phone, don’t touch his phone,” he tells the hospital worker.
She then tells the man that he is “hurting my unborn baby,” to which the black man replies, “You put your belly on my hand.”
The woman then turns and starts screaming for help again, whereupon one of her colleagues approaches.
The black man tries to explain, “This is my bike, it’s on my account,” and says to the woman, “Please go away.”
At that point, the woman can be seen seemingly crying, though the black man’s friends say they are fake tears.
At one point, the woman accuses the black man of assault, saying he’s “hurting my unborn baby,” though the man says she put his stomach on his hand
At one point in the video, the woman also grabs the black man’s cell phone
The woman could even be seen crying in the video as she jumped onto the disputed bike
Black man’s friends accused hospital worker of ‘faking crying’ saying she didn’t even shed a tear
She then continues to climb on the bike, hysterical with tears, as her colleague suggests they just “reset the bike.”
But the man’s friends keep defending him, saying, “It’s his, it’s his.”
One of the friends then again accuses the woman of “faking crying” and tells her to stop, while the black man asks her to “stop touching me.”
The woman then gets off the bike and apparently stops crying when she pulls out her phone.
“Not a tear has fallen, ma’am,” the friend says at the end of the video.
Per Citi Bike’s policy, anyone who leaves a bike outside for more than 45 minutes will be charged $0.17 for each additional minute and may have their account suspended.
If a customer does not return a bike within 24 hours, the account holder will be charged a lost or stolen bike fee of $1,200 plus tax.
Bellevue Hospital has announced that it is investigating the incident with its employee
DailyMail.com has reached out to Lyft, which operates the Citi Bikes, for comment.
A spokesman for the New York Police Department said it has not received any 911 calls or reports of the incident, but is aware of the video.
Meanwhile, Bellevue Hospital said in a statement that it is investigating the incident.
“We recently became aware of an incident that occurred off-campus over the weekend that appears to involve one of our employees,” it said.
“We are sorry this happened and we are looking into the incident.”
The hospital added that it is “committed to providing all New Yorkers with the highest quality of care with dignity, cultural sensitivity and compassion.”