New York City serial subway stabber is in custody, report says

Two people are dead and two are injured following the attacks this weekend

A man suspected of being involved in a series of stabbings on the New York City subway has been taken into custody, according to reports.

The attacks left two people dead and two people injured in separate attacks over a 24-hour period on Friday and Saturday.

Law enforcement sources told the New York Post that a man was detained on Sunday following the assaults which all happened on the A line in upper Manhattan and Queens.

During an earlier press conference, Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said police believed that all four attacks had been carried out by the same person. He also said that all four victims were homeless.

One victim was found dead on a train in Queens about midnight on Friday with several stab wounds to his neck and torso.

In the early hours of Saturday, a 44-year-old woman was found with fatal stab wounds to her body on a subway train in upper Manhattan.

Two other men were injured in non-fatal stabbings. A 67-year-old was stabbed on Friday at around 11.30 am as he pushed his walker along the southbound platform at 181st Street station in Washington Heights,The Post said.

A 43-year-old man was reportedly stabbed in the back early on Saturday as he slept in a station stairwell at West 181st Street.

The man ran to a bank following the stabbing and collapsed, The New York Times reported. He is currently in a stable condition in hospital.

The unidentified suspect was taken into custody at the 34th Precinct in Washington Heights, sources told The Post.

The Times reported that police officers had detained a man near the scene of the attacks in Upper Manhattan.

In the wake of the stabbings, the New York Police Department (NYPD) deployed an additional 500 officers into the subway system across the city as a safety measure.

"To the victims, to the victims’ families, we are 100 per cent committed to getting justice. to bring closure to the families of this terrible incident," Commissioner Shea said during the news conference.

A law enforcement official briefed on the investigation told The Times that investigators are looking into whether the man is connected to earlier similar attacks.

The Independent has contacted the NYPD for comment.

Additional reporting by the Associated Press