Five people are recovering after an acid attack in Jersey City, in a frightening assault that unfolded out on a city street. According to authorities, someone drove up in a vehicle and threw acid on a group of people, leaving several of them needing hospital treatment and prompting a police response to the scene.
The attack took place on Wilkinson Avenue. By the account given by officials, the person responsible pulled up in the vehicle and hurled the substance directly at the group before driving off, turning an ordinary moment on the block into a sudden emergency for the people who were hit.
Investigators are still working to pin down exactly what was used in the attack. At this point, officials believe the substance that was thrown at the group was sulfuric acid, the kind of corrosive chemical that can cause serious harm when it comes into contact with the skin.
Police do not believe the attack was a random act. They say it appears to have stemmed from some kind of dispute that had taken place earlier in the day, an indication that the people who were targeted may have been singled out rather than caught up in a chance encounter on the street.
As more details emerged, the city's account came into sharper focus. The five people struck were all women, and the mayor, James Solomon, said police would work around the clock until they found whoever was responsible, with investigators now searching for two suspects. By the account given by the mayor and police, the attack followed an earlier incident involving a large group of people on Wilkinson Avenue, after which the two suspects came back and tossed the liquid at the five women. There were conflicting reports about how they arrived, with one suggesting the pair were in a car and another that they were riding a moped at the moment the substance was thrown.
The five women were taken to Jersey City Medical Center, where the victims were treated for injuries that ranged from skin burns to peeling, all of them described as non-life-threatening. For now, officials have not released information identifying the victims and there was still no word on the suspects, with anyone who has information urged to contact the Jersey City police.
All five people who were struck were taken to the hospital in the aftermath of the attack. There, they were treated for injuries that officials described as non-life-threatening, and they were said to be recovering, an outcome that could have been far worse given the substance involved.
As the investigation developed, there was a significant breakthrough. Police said a teenager had been taken into custody and was now under arrest over the attack, the first arrest reported in the case. In the later accounts, the number of people struck was put at six, and one of the victims was said to be receiving care in a hospital burn unit, a sign that at least some of the injuries were more serious than the initial descriptions had suggested. Investigators indicated they would set out what they believed had motivated the attack.
Fuller details of the toll emerged later in the day. A 21-year-old woman among those hurt was transferred to the burn unit at St. Barnabas Hospital, where she was being treated for second-degree burns to her face and scalp, a far graver injury than the early descriptions of skin irritation had suggested. Witnesses described hearing the victims scream that it burned, with some pressing towels to their faces in the aftermath. Police said the suspect taken into custody was a juvenile, that charges against the young person were still pending, and that the attack appeared to have been targeted, stemming from an earlier dispute. The assault had unfolded outside a home at around 7:40 on Monday night, on Wilkinson Avenue near Ocean Avenue, and three of the young women caught up in it were teenage girls.
The fact that the attack was carried out from a vehicle, in the open and against a group of people, has unsettled the neighborhood. With a suspect now in custody and the apparent dispute behind the attack still being examined, the focus turns to establishing exactly what happened on Wilkinson Avenue, who else may have been involved, and what drove someone to hurl a corrosive chemical at a group of people in the street.