The Upper West Side has devolved into a Wild West atmosphere where anything goes, terrified crime victims and neighbors begging for more cops told The Post.
Criminals are more emboldened than ever in the ritzy nabe — with robberies soaring over 30% compared to last year — and carjackers so brazen they flashed their guns without concern on consecutive Sundays in broad daylight.
“I have never felt so scared in this neighborhood the way I feel now,” one of the carjacking victims told The Post this week.
The woman, who wished to remain anonymous for fear for her safety, had just parked her $245,000 2024 Mercedes G Wagon at West 83rd and Broadway on Nov. 17 at 10 a.m. when two men who pulled up alongside her in a grey Acura and pointed “big and dark grey” guns at her chest.
“‘Give me your f—ing purse! Where’s the f—ing keys?’” the men barked at the woman, 44, who has worked at a nearby hair salon for the last 20 years.
“I was so scared…I was screaming so much,” she recalled.
Cops later found the Mercedes in The Bronx and returned it, according to the woman, who also said the thieves had unsuccessfully tried to remove the computer from the dashboard, causing nearly $50,000 worth of damage.
“I am not doing very good…every person who passes by me with a mask, I start shaking. It’s so scary,” said the still-terrified woman.
Carjackers with a nearly identical MO struck again a week later.
Jenny Zhou was putting into her $100,000 BMW X7 outside of her Riverside Boulevard building on Nov. 24 at around noon when the creeps approached in the same Acura.
When a Good Samaritan tried to intervene, the men again flashed a gun, she said.
“I was in shock, I was so scared,” Zhou, 57, told The Post about the Sunday ordeal. “I would never expect this to happen in such a great residential area.”
Zhou’s car hasn’t been found and no arrests have been made in either case. Cops are investigating the possibility that the perps are the same in both incidents.
The carjackers and other shameless criminals are “emboldened by the lack of prosecution for anything in New York City,” a veteran NYPD detective said.
“They’re also doing it in broad daylight so they’re not even caring who’s around. [Manhattan District Attorney Alvin] Bragg is going to have to step up and do something,” the detective added.
So far this year, the NYPD’s 20th Precinct, which encompasses the neighborhood up to West 86th Street, has seen 31% more robberies, 14% more felony assaults, 31% more burglaries and 6% more grand larcenies compared to the same time period in 2023. Overall, major crime is up 6%, the data show.
And recent, random violence — an 81-year-old woman was sucker-punched while walking on West 66th Street and a 55-year-old Danish tourist was randomly stabbed on West 86th Street — has neighbors on edge.
So much so that many in the famously liberal neighborhood — which reportedly donated the most dough to Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign in the five boroughs– are imploring the NYPD for more law enforcement.
“I think people think that they’re careful, and maybe they don’t go out that much after dark – but now, that’s not any guarantee that something isn’t going to happen to you in the middle of the day, with or without a gun,” said Katina Ellison, a 50-year UWS resident and co-founder of the West 71st Street Block Association.
The block association created a 10-point proposal to reduce crime after shots rang out around 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 31 at West 71st Street and Broadway, injuring two teenagers. More cops are at the top of their list.
“We just definitely need more police on foot on an ongoing basis, spread out over more of the area,” Ellison explained.
Papa, 51, had just returned home to his West 71st Street apartment from trick-or-treating with his five-year-old daughter when the shots were fired.
“I don’t understand, why aren’t there police officers here?” Papa said. “It’s disheartening.”