Assamad Nash, a homeless man who allegedly slaughtered a 35-year-old Christina Yuna Lee in her Chinatown apartment over the weekend, claimed, “I didn’t kill nobody!” after he was charged in her murder Monday.
Nash’s denial came as he was led away in handcuffs from the NYPD’s 5th Precinct in Lower Manhattan moments after being booked on murder and burglary raps in the Sunday morning homicide.
“I don’t know what’s going on!” he continued before he was led into a waiting police car.
Age
He is 25 years old.
Assamad Nash Stabbed Christina Yuna Lee
Nash is accused of following Lee into her Chrystie Street apartment just after 4 a.m. Sunday, stabbing her to death as she cried for help and screamed to neighbours, “Call 911!”
Chilling surveillance footage obtained by The Post shows Nash tailing Lee from when she returned home. As the woman made her way up to six flights of stairs to her apartment, Nash followed close behind and forced his way into the apartment just before the door closed.
When police arrived at the unit, Nash tried to escape using the apartment’s fire escape and then barricaded himself inside when spotted on the stairwell.
Members of the NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit eventually busted the door down and found Lee bleeding to death in a bathtub and Nash hiding under a bed.
Neighbour said that Lee, a creative producer who worked for the music platform Splice, previously lived in New Jersey and had only been in the unit for less than a year.
An NYPD spokesperson said her murder is not being treated as a hate crime at this time.
Before Sunday, Nash racked up at least ten arrests in New York and New Jersey that date back to 2012, according to police and law enforcement sources.
He currently has three open cases in Manhattan, known as the “transit swiper,” due to his alleged history of crime underground.
Criminal Record
On Sept. 28, Nash allegedly punched a man in the face after he swiped a woman’s MetroCard at the Grand Street subway station, telling him, “I’m going to punch you if you swipe her,” a police source revealed.
He was released on a desk appearance ticket, police sources said.
“He’s a transit swiper,” a police source explained. “He’s not mentally all there.”
Five days earlier, Nash was arrested for selling a MetroCard swipe for $2 at the same station and was found with K2, or synthetic marijuana, in his pocket, according to a criminal complaint and police sources.
“Can I get my K2 back?” he asked a cop who arrested him, according to the complaint. “I love K2.”
Nash was most recently captured on Jan. 6 for damaging dozens of MetroCard machines at three different Manhattan subway stations between Dec. 8 and Dec. 31, court records show.
During that arrest, he tried to escape from police custody – pushing open the doors to the police van and running off after cops captured him at Sixth Avenue and West 34th Street, the criminal complaint states.
His charges in connection to that case include 27 counts of criminal mischief, records show.
He was also released on a desk appearance ticket in that case.
Nash was previously busted on July 28 for the unauthorized sale of a fare card, according to police sources.
The sources said his oldest New York arrest was in March 2015 for criminal trespassing.
In Newark, Nash was arrested twice in 2014 for robbery and unlawful possession of a firearm, law-enforcement sources said.
According to the sources, he was busted as a minor, both in 2012 and 2013, for burglary and criminal mischief in Hillside Township.
