A postal worker in Harlem attacked a trans woman. She fought back and fatally stabbed him in self-defense. This is how the NY Post framed it.

You don't shoot two mags into someone out of self defense and you don't stab someone 14 times out of self defense. But hey, it's not like she had committed knife crimes 5 times before that.

She cut in line, he yelled slurs, she spat, he punched and then she stabbed him to death. And then proceeded to tell people she would do it again and was glad he died. Yeah, you're kind of a shitty person for this.

Punch the guy, stun gun the guy, pepper spray the guy, you have my blessing and support. You don't fucking kill someone.

The entire media campaign surrounding this is also despicable: For one group, she is the living embodiment of the ebul trans people, who are all just men in disguise trying to molest kids, for another group she is a brave, yet innocent bean who should be totally acquitted. Both groups are morons.

IMHO, she should serve a long ass sentence.

Yeah the fact that she is transgender has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that she murdered someone, the only reason the press is including that fact is to stir up drama, hate, and ad revenue. It's pretty despicable, but I have come to expect nothing more from the press. There is no such thing as an honourable news reporter these days, just gossip columnists.
- My read on it is that they’re intentionally cross wiring it to blur the issue and attach a negative colloquialism to trans people. This is part of how a group becomes considered untermensch by our illustriously imbecilic regime. If I was trans I would gtfo the country now, no joke. This is some goebbels-type shit, so you know it’s probably Steven Miller’s idea, that fucking psychotic dweeb
- It was self defense though, not murder. Seems like she just got carried away with defending herself instead of being killed. It's a kill or be killed world out there.
don't shoot two mags into someone out of self defense and you don't stab someone 14 times out of self defense.
I work in a trauma ward. It's not unusual to see people get stabbed dozens of times, whether it's self defense or not. People who get stabbed don't get dropped like a gun shot wound victim, they bleed out.
So more often or not if there's a confrontation with a knife people will keep stabbing until the person stops being a threat, which can take a while.
- Yeah it's not like the movies, people don't just fall over when they're grazed by a blade or pistol-caliber bullet. If all I had was a knife to defend myself against an attacker I would choose "keep stabbing until they stop moving" even if that looks worse to juries. Better than being shot in the back trying to run.
Yeah she did a dick move then escalated into murder with 0 remorse. Life without parole.
- Wait it's self defense though, and not murder.
Yeah but this just makes her a shitty human, there was no need to mention they were trans.
To be fair: once self-defense “kicks in” (in any case, not just this one), one should empty two mags if it is what it takes to make the threat stop. or feel like it stopped.
That’s the thing about self defense, you don’t get to decide how much is too much, if you are on the receiving end. All you get to do is NOT make it something your victim decides to implement in the first place.
- Imma be honest: if you reload after dumping the first mag into someone, it's getting into manslaughter territory.
  Self defense is also (at least in Germany, don't know how it's handled in the Land of the Castle Doctrine) about a measured response. Using a weapon after feeling your life is in danger: A-okay. Bashing someone's skull in repeatedly after they stopped being a threat: not so okay. The police shooting an attacker three times in the chest: A-okay. Dumping two mags into someone: definitely not okay.
Holy shit she emptied two mags into him and then stabbed him 14 times and then claimed self defense? That's actually insane.
- No. She just stabbed him. I said that as an example.
- Think about all the transphobes who will now see trans people as violent and callous. If this has any effect, it'll increase the likelihood of violent attacks.
- If only transgender people killed everyone they interacted with, there wouldn't be any transphobia /s
  Grow up. She's a murderer and deserves to rot in jail.
- Next time they wont spit, they'll escalate further ti avoid retaliation

Did he attack her though? Seems from the articles I read that she spat on him first. That's the attack.

It also seems she was arrested 5 times prior for knife crimes.

"I separate them. The mail guy in the front, the lady she was in back. She spit on him, in his face. And mail guy, he got mad. Lemon juice next to the coffee machine, he threw on her. So she took the knife," the deli worker said.
Witnesses claimed that, in an instant, Cruz pulled out a knife and fatally stabbed Hodge.
Yeah
Cruz stands a towering 6 feet 5 inches tall. Witnesses to the murder described her as huge, and said she appeared to be high on drugs during her confrontation with Hodges.
...
Well thanks for adding a +1 to the womens murder rate and not to mens, we need it
- TBH this community is pretty consistent for these sort of takes. Rage no matter how impotent is welcome here, but they issue warnings to people who want to de-escelate and look at the facts.
There's 15 very big reasons that say it was certainly not self-defence.
- There's a reason they tell you NOT to use a knife in a self defense scenario. It is nearly impossible to defend especially if you kill the attacker.
  I think you statistically have a better chance of getting away with "executioner style" shots with a gun than knife use in self defense.

You know something is up when they state that they are transgender when it bears no meaning to the actual article. This would be the same as "Gay man murdered people" the point is bigotry.

Violently homosexual man brutalizes innocent bystander in gay rage.
- You gotta mention that the innocent bystanders are straight, or else conservatives won’t know whether to feel sorry for them or be happy they were attacked.
- If a WASP with a trump shrine and 20 guns has mental health issues and kills 4 people it’s mental health issues.
  If anyone not fitting the conservative mold, even if they have mental health issues, kills people it’s about their differences from the mold that come first. “Mental health” might get a one line mention at the bottom of the article.
- That's my point, gender has no relation to violent crimes, bringing it up in the headline is just bigoted
- The real story is “Mentally Ill Person with a History of Knife Crime Stabs Mail Carrier in Fight”
  To the people who consider them being trans headline-worthy, "trans person" and "mentally-ill person" are synonyms.
- In a world where cis men have been deemed not guilty for murdering trans people just because they couldn't tell until they got to the sex, there is no way I'd hold a trans person guilty of murder for defending themselves from an ongoing assault that very well could have escalated to a murder against her.
Yeah, you hardly ever hear Christian gunman kills X children at school.

“I killed him laughing,” she said. “Oh, well. I’ll piss on his grave.”

“I did spit on him because he called me a f—-t,” Cruz’s confession reads. “I called him a dirty monkey. You said hurtful words, so I said hurtful words to you.”

As their dispute escalated, Cruz claimed that Hodges struck her three times before she pulled a knife and stabbed him in self-defense, according to court documents. “I told him, ‘You come to me and I’ll kill you,'” Cruz told investigators. “No motherf—-rs are going to put their hands on me no more.”

Hodges, who lived in the Bronx, reacted to the stabbing with astonishment, saying, “You really stabbed me?” to which Cruz replied, “Yes I did,” court documents state.

“I got in between them — twice,” said Janet Rich, who was in the deli buying coffee when the fight broke out. “There was another woman with dreadlocks [who] said, ‘Don’t do this. You have a good job. Let this go.’”

It's interesting to see how women generally react using reasoning and deescalation - which is commendable - but also knowing crime statistics against women maybe it wouldn't be the worst thing if men feared that assaulting a woman could end up getting you stabbed.

Too bad she seem quite evil with the whole "killing him laughing" thing - but I'm sure this isn't going to get twisted into all trans women are dangerous criminals and should be locked up in men's prisons...

This is so disgusting because she totally deserved to stab him in self defense. Getting hit three times necessitates self defense.
And I, a ciswoman, laugh when shit gets real because I have weird berserker blood or something. I can't control it, so if I'm going to stab someone in self defense, I would probably be laughing, too.
- She could have filmed him and got him fired. You spit on people you get punched. If you are going to start a fight don't do it by doing something that instantly starts the fight while doing nothing to actually slow down your opponent. She could still have backed away, used pepper spray, used a taser, punched back.
  All of these would see him face 99.9% of the consequences instead of him being dead and her life ruined.
  You can't start a fight and claim self care.
- So bodily fluids of other ppl really gross me out, does that mean getting spit on gives me the right to use self defence? Id rather get punched many many times than spit on for context
if these type of men fear getting stabbed, they might just knock them out in one hit instead of spitting on them, both scenarios are bad
- 💅💅💅
  Queen you are so getting banned for this but I need you to know that it's 100% worth it

He threw a plastic bottle and she then stabbed him to death. She was charged with 2nd degree murder and pleaded guilty.

Yeah, as much as this framing of "pure evil" is nonsense, where they quote the family of the deceased - everything I found does not make this a legitimate case of self-defense, even if 100% of her story is true.
Quoting from this one:
https://www.nydailynews.com/2025/05/30/jaia-cruz-admits-stabbing-postal-worker-death-harlem-deli-sentenced/
Cruz’s attorney claimed his client, a transgender woman, lashed out against Hodges because the 36-year-old postal worker had made a slur “about her gender identity.”
Hodges and Cruz were waiting in the sandwich line at the deli counter at Joe’s Grocery, on Lenox Ave. near W. 118th St., on Jan. 2 when the postal worker accused her of cutting the line.
Cruz claimed that Hodges had ridiculed her with homophobic remarks and struck her several times before she pulled a knife and fatally stabbed him.
She showed no remorse for her actions when interviewed by detectives at the 28th Precinct in Harlem.
“I hope he’s maggot food,” Cruz told detectives, according to court documents. “I killed him laughing. Oh, well. I’ll piss on his grave.”
While there is some sympathy for her there with me, understanding that some things can just make you snap - unless there are very different laws at play, answering harrassment over a fight over cutting in line with several repeated stabs is legally never self-defense.
And while morally, not "pure evil" by a long shot, and them presenting it as such is despicable - but trans people are people, and people can do shitty people things, like murder someone in overreaction when a fight escalates. The other guy using slurs, and even striking her is no excuse, if you pull a knife during a fistfight, and then repeatedly stab the other person - with witnesses reporting they tried to break up the fight, so potential for de-escalation was there - even if they are scum and started the thing, you are not just defending yourself, you got angry and out of that anger - no matter how justified that anger was - you killed a person.

ITT: propaganda successfully vilifying trans people as a group and idiots gobbling it up

Ask yourself why the news never specifies criminals gender identities unless it's one of the scapegoats.

Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives

I doubt they framed the dude who chocked the homeless man to death on the subway as a "disgusting human being"
- Upstanding heterosexual cisgendered male citizen forced to take homeless bum's life in deadly subway altercation.

Yea, as awful as the NY Post is for framing it this way, this ain't about them being trans. She bought a knife, wanted to stab someone, picked a fight and continually escalated (she fucking spat on him, sorry but bodily fluids are an assault and the dude had every right to treat it as being hit) until she pulled a knife in an encounter she started.

Got hit three times before pulling a knife? Just cuz she was too fucking slow to stab him after the first hit like she wanted to.

Can't believe there's people defending this.

I'm guessing that people are defending transgenders in general and this shitbait NY post article frames it in. Away that isn't too far off from insinuating that all trans are "pure evil".
Hell, "trans" shouldn't have been in the headline as it is of no consequence to what happened. Whatever the reason for the incident, she didn't stab the guy because she's trans. One human stabbed another, that one was trans or black or green for all I care doesn't matter and it is very hard not to feel that this bit was added just to sow division amongst people
- it's a dogwhistle. they're implying that trans people are mentally ill and that the postal worker is a victim of inaction with or indulgence in the trans population.
  It's the same reason why all the chuds started banging out about how violent trans people/leftists are when that trans man (~~if i remember correctly~~ i did) shot up a school a year or so ago.
  despite the fact that the overwhelming amount of school shooters are cis right wing incels
- Duh, because it's the NY Post. They are trash. That's why most comments have even been prefacing statements about the defendant talking about how shitty the Post is.
She bought a knife, wanted to stab someone
Sorry, but when a "news" journal is that deep into batshit clickbait propaganda, you can't use other articles written by them as a source of truth. Hell the second article isn't even an article it's just a statement with no source, wrapped in acid.
I'm not saying she's innocent or that it was called for, but there's no reliable truth in that article other than the man is dead.
Guns aren't allowed in New York, She's trans, needs to protect herself. It was a steak knife, not exactly a weapon you use to fight someone for funsies.
If she was pure evil, she would have gotten 25 years. They gave her 15 because she was in the wrong, but it wasn't black and white.
- Here's CBS.
  https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/usps-worker-stabbed-to-death-in-harlem/
  Keep being a heroic dumbass

“I killed him laughing. Oh, well. I’ll piss on his grave.”

Sorry, but this IS pure evil.

Yeah, I'm trans and find this pretty indefensible. I've gotten slurs yelled at me, I've never started a physical fight over it and certainly never fucking stabbed someone 14 times to death.
- Yeah, I'd probably feel worse for her if she seemed to have felt anything about this. There's no reason to ever feel happy about having killed someone. Perhaps relieved as in a "it's finally over" kind of way. But finding the fact that you've killed someone funny? Not reasonable whatsoever. He shouldn't have called her slurs, but words deserve words, actions deserve action. Fuck both of them.
- Wild that in the article it says he hit her 3 times before she stabbed him.

NY Post is staffed by scumbag shitheads.

Exactly, and if they stopped "reporting" things this way they'd go out of business and their horrible customers would probably make something even worse more popular.

Here is CBS's coverage of the event:

A deli worker told CBS News New York that Hodge was ordering a sandwich when a woman at the counter got angry and began arguing with him over who was first in line to order. According to the deli worker, in that instant, the woman pulled out a knife and stabbed Hodge in the stomach. USPS confirmed Hodge was a letter carrier assigned to Manhattan.

It appears to have started over a dispute over who was first in line. It's up to you to decide if that's a rational reason to attack someone with a knife, regardless of your sexuality / gender identity.

https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/usps-worker-stabbed-to-death-in-harlem/

In this version nobody attacked her.
Ny post is still anti -trans regardless

Not sure why the perpetrator being trans was important enough to put in the title, considering it didn't seem to have anything to do with the crime....

It maybe had a little bit of something to do with the slurs? If the other participant wasn't trans, then I think the guy would've probably used different insults, probably not racial slurs, idk for sure though. Not sure, but I feel as though she'd probably have reacted in a similar manner. But the reason they put it in the title, is because the NY Post wants people to feel like trans people are dangerous. They've been targeting trans girls for a while now, especially with the bathroom bullshit, shameful.

Does this mean they'll put "cisgender" in the title for all the other criminals?

Yeah, this is a tabloid. In a decent world people running tabloids would be imprisoned or doing thousands of hours of community service.

Link?

https://www.yahoo.com/news/jaia-cruz-admits-stabbing-postal-195900760.html

Its insane how every single trans and queer person is expected to be perfect law abiding citizens or suddenly the act of being Queer makes you a murderer. They used the same justification during the Holocaust to murder Jews and they're using the justification to murder Palestinians.

If she'd strangled a homeless person in the subway instead, she'd be a national hero.

You claim the postal worker attacked the woman. I'm not finding any information about that. What was the nature of this "attack"?

this post is complete dogshit. "self defense" my ass

- You can absolutely get murdered by an unarmed person
- After getting hit 3 times?
- That's easy to say when you're not the one getting punched in the face repeatedly. You never know how far a violent person will go.

Here's a news source with an account of what allegedly happened. Of course nothing has been proven in court yet.

According to the charges, Hodge was at the store’s sandwich counter when Cruz cut in line, leading a dispute between the pair. After a witness separated them, Cruz allegedly went into their bag while Hodge’s back was turned, retrieved a knife and threatened him with it.

Prosecutors said Cruz then allegedly threw a plastic bottle at Hodge before lunging at him, stabbing him multiple times in the chest, neck, and arms. After a struggle in which Hodge attempted to wrestle the weapon away from her, he collapsed. A witness reported hearing Cruz remark: “He deserved it.”

Hodges was rushed to Harlem Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

“This alleged broad-daylight stabbing shook the neighborhood, including the deli workers and customers who witnessed the attack,” said District Attorney Bragg. “My thoughts are with those grieving the loss of Ray Hodge, a postal worker and beloved father of two.”

After her arrest, Cruz reportedly admitted to police that she stabbed Hodge with a knife she carried for “protection.” Cruz also allegedly referred to Hodge as a racial slur.

Not sounding good.

“He rolls up his sleeves, and then he hits my client, and every time he approaches her, she backs up. And he approaches her again, she backs up until she’s all the way at the refrigerator and then when he’s still berating her and calling her a f**got and a tranny, she spat at him,” Schuman said. “You can see on the video that she’s saying to him, leave me alone. But he doesn’t leave her alone. He attacks her again.”

So there is an alleged video with contradicts a lot of what the witnesses say. I'd be cautious of defending this one. If it turns out that the lawyer is just exaggerating an unclear video, youre probably going to get tricked into defending an awful person. Again.

Cruz (the stabber) plead guilty.
- The stabbing isn't the question, the question is whether it was self defense or murder.
- Is this something that just happened? The article I linked says she admits she stabbed him, but pleads not guilty to the charge of murder, I believe on the grounds of self defense. Considering New York's typical (extremely hostile) stance on self defense pleas I'd be surprised if the judge agrees though.

Identity politics are cancerous

Ahh the good ole broken post

The framing uses quotes from the vicrim impact statements from the family of the victim.

Can't really expect better from that rag

People need to stop picking sides and in groups. If people are mistreating you it doesn't really matter what group you belong in as that's more just for personal identification and doesn't help the situation at all to defend based on sides.

Ehh, no one here will care when our identity is all we think that matters. But this just further divides the groups and continues the work of the assholes that think it useful to do so.

Transphobe bigot: attacks trans woman for being trans, in a clear case of hate crime
Lemmy bazinga brains: "guys let's just stop picking sides"
- That is not what happened. Literally please one of the many recaps or article links about this person that cut in line then stabbed the person that called them out for it and not just headlines and assume you understand everything.
Tell me you're privileged without telling me you're privileged
- Yeah I am not. I don't have the privilege and never have to stab my attackers and they get away with being seen as good people despite the trauma I am left with. I'm a member of the LGBTQ community and was sexually assaulted by 2 partners and a parent.
  You just don't like people disagreeing with your point of view so you decide you know who they are to justify thinking they must be a person you dismiss.
  Shame I asked for community and good treatment of others.

You're saying that framing trans people as evil sociopaths is based...?
- I think the intent was 'based girl standing up for herself to the point of killing a dude', but I could be wrong.
- [annoying tiktok voice]
  WOW such literacy skills

that's breitbart level of misinformation right here

467 upvotes, lemmy. Congrats, you're as full of shit as right wingers.

I'm opposed to her facing consequences for killing him. If it had been a white cis woman instead, we wouldn't be here

Correct. You would not be defending a cisgender murderer. On the the "right side" gets to do whatever they want.

The last sentence isn't about the trans woman but the author describing themselves.

I hope she gets acquitted.

Maybe read the story before sharing your opinion
- Maybe that is their opinion after reading it?
- this post is about the headline right? So I reacted on that headline alone.

Look at all the heroic liberals blindly defending a psycho.

Read the fucking article

Most people are not defending her, but are instead upset by the blatantly bigoted framing of the article.
Read the fucking headline.
- Uhhh. No I am actually seeing at least half of the conversation in here being about how they did nothing wrong and should have stabbed the post-worker.
  Literally on my comment is someone making up a version of the story based in the OP version of the story to declare an innacurate version of this event.

She stabbed him because he was s mail man?

The fuck?

Not helping dude

How bad is your reading comprehension?