The stepson of former New York Governor David Paterson was courageously hit on the head after stepping in front of him when they were ambushed by a mob.
Anthony Chester Sliwa, 20, and Paterson, 70, managed to defeat the thugs who jumped them on New York City’s Upper East Side on Friday around 8:30 p.m.
Curtis Silwa, leader of vigilante group Guardian Angels and Anthony’s biological father, explained how he and Paterson, who is legally blind, “held their ground” against three teenagers and two much older adult attackers.
“David is blind so he couldn’t see what was going on at first so Anthony had to guide him and then stand in front of him and take a lot of blows,” Silwa told DailyMail.com.
“He said the adults were the ones hitting the hardest.”
Former New York Governor David Paterson was brutally attacked by a trio of teenagers after he and his son tried to prevent them from climbing a fire escape in Manhattan.
Anthony, now 20, is the biological son of 2021 Republican mayoral hopeful Curtis Sliwa and grew up with special needs. He suffered more serious bruises and cuts, along with a possible concussion
Silwa said his son, who was trained in martial arts by the Guardian Angels, told him, “I did what I had to do, Dad” when they spoke Saturday morning.
“I told him I was very proud of him, he was a true New Yorker, both of them. “They held their ground, they didn’t retreat, they didn’t run,” he said.
Anthony suffered a split lip and was awaiting a CAT scan to see if he had a concussion.
Paterson’s representatives previously said the former governor suffered minor injuries to his face and body.
Silwa said they were both released from NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center in the early morning hours and were not admitted.
However, Silwa said he expected them to be “traumatized” by the attack and “never be the same again.”
David Paterson, 70, and his stepson, Anthony Chester Sliwa, 20, encountered the teens on Second Avenue near East 96th Street shortly before 9 p.m. Friday.
Apparently a confrontation broke out after Paterson and his son ordered the three young men to stop climbing the fire escape
Silwa explained that the pair were walking the dog along their usual route when Anthony spotted three teenagers climbing a fire escape at a local mosque.
He said there was a brief verbal altercation before Paterson and Anthony continued.
But as they walked around the block, they were spotted by the three teens, who were with an adult man and woman in a McDonalds on Second Avenue near East 96th Street.
All five then immediately attacked them in front of dozens of witnesses, none of whom Silwa claimed intervened.
The attack was filmed on multiple security cameras and police are hunting for the attackers, Silwa said.
The teenagers then launched a senseless attack on the 70-year-old and his son. They both suffered facial injuries
Following the incident, the former governor was rushed to New York Cornell Medical Center, where he was reportedly in “ok.”
Paterson’s spokesman previously said the governor and his stepson “suffered some injuries but were able to fend off their attackers.”
The statement also said that they “have already filed a police report.”
After the attack, the group of teens quickly fled the scene. The authorities were looking for them.
Paterson, a Democrat, was the 55th governor of New York, serving from 2008 to 2010.
He was the first legally blind person to assume the governorship in any state. And he was the first black governor of New York.