The man accused of entering the home of a New York rabbi and stabbing five people with a machete in a horrifying anti-Semitic attack on Saturday night was taken into police custody hours after the attack.
Ramapo Police Chief Brad Weidel said on Sunday the suspect – identified as Grafton E. Thomas, 37, of Greenwood Lake, New York – will face five counts of attempted murder and one count of burglary.
Police said Thomas entered the home of Rabbi Chaim Rottenberg in Monsey, a suburb north of New York City, during a Hanukkah celebration - the latest in a string of anti-Semitic incidents in recent weeks that including beatings of Jewish people in the streets of New York City and a massacre at a kosher grocery store in Jersey City, N.J.
Police said Thomas fled the scene of the stabbing but was later captured in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City.