Man Arrested in Fatal Stabbing of Bangladesh-Born Woman in Queens

Police arrested a man for fatally stabbing a New York woman in what many are calling a hate crime.

Yonatan Galvez-Marin was charged in the stabbing of Nazma Khanam, a 60-year-old Bangladesh-born woman living in Queens, police said Sunday.

Khanam was killed a few feet away from her husband on Wednesday night after the two were walking home from a souvenir shop. Galvez-Marin allegedly approached and asked Khanam for money. When she refused, he stabbed her repeatedly and then fled.

“Somebody killed me,” Khanam screamed, according to her husband who found the weapon sticking out of her body.

Khanam’s death come weeks after the shooting of imam Maulama Akonjee and his associate Thara Uddin as they left a Queens mosque. Like the killing of Akongee and Uddin, the NYPD has not labeled the stabbing as a hate crime; however, the department’s hate crime unit is looking into the case, a spokesperson said on Sunday.

Hundreds gathered at the Jamaica Muslim Center for Khanam’s funeral service on Friday, where her family spoke and mourned. Many who attended the funeral said they believe the killing was a hate crime.

“This was not a robbery and though we do not know all the facts, the reality is this is happening too often,” public advocate Letitia James said, according to the Guardian.

Khanam’s nephew is a New York Police Department transit officer, and several police officers attended the funeral service.

Galvez-Marin, 22, was charged with second-degree murder, robbery and criminal possession of a weapon