The suspect is a resident of a homeless shelter nearby

Oct 2, 2013 07:08 GMT  ·  By

A homeless man attacked five people with a scissors in Riverside Park on Tuesday, leaving them either stabbed or slashed. An 18-month-old is one of the victims, police sources say.

Police have apprehended the suspect, Julius Graham of Harlem, a man residing in a shelter. Graham has mental issues and he has gone on a stabbing rampage in the park.

According to Pix 11, the attacks started at 7:50 a.m. and took place in the area from 59th Street to 72nd Street along the Hudson River. He first stabbed a 36-year-old female jogger in the back.

“She was screaming,” sanitation worker and witness, Shurita Fields, describes the first stabbing. The jogger has been identified as Deanna Koestell.

”I told her to be calm, and that we were going to stay with her ’til she’s okay,” she recalls.

A second jogger and a pedestrian followed, before he set his sights on a man walking his toddler in a stroller.

The New York Daily News reports that Graham's second victim is a 35-year-old man stabbed in the stomach.

Ben Loehnen “thought he was punched in the stomach by the individual, but he was stabbed,” Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly detailed. Loehnen is an editor with Simon & Schuster.

The suspect was wrestled to the ground and immobilized by Thomas Ciriacks, who was walking his dog. Ciriacks reacted to the screams of the third victim, Jessica Lipes. The jogger had her throat slashed.

Graham was on his way to attack 35-year-old James Fayette, and his son, Luke. Fayette jumped over the toddler to protect him but he was injured, as was Luke.

“It was absolute mayhem. . . . This guy was encircling his child, protecting him. [...] He came to this woman’s aid and he had a child to protect. . . . He’s absolutely a hero,” Ciriacks notes.

All the victims have survived the attack and Graham has been charged with five counts of assault, criminal possession of a weapon and resisting arrest.