Man with knife, yelling 'Heil Hitler!,' chases Jewish student in Brooklyn, charged with hate crime, NYPD says

Roni Jacobson and Rocco Parascandola, New York Daily News on Sep 24, 2026

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NEW YORK — A man was arrested and charged with a hate crime for threatening a Jewish student and chasing him down a Brooklyn street with a knife while shouting “Heil Hitler!,” cops said on Thursday.

Devin Best, 48, was arrested and charged with menacing and aggravated harassment as a hate crime after cursing at the 24-year-old victim and chasing him with a knife down Park Place near New York Avenue in Crown Heights while yelling the Nazi salute on Wednesday around 2:48 a.m., according to police.

The victim can be seen running full speed away from a man chasing him down with a knife before escaping into a building in a harrowing video taken from a surveillance camera, posted on X by Crown Heights Shmira. The man then menacingly points his knife at the building’s front door for several seconds and seethes, “Now I know where you live! That’s what I wanted! Heil f—in’ Hitler!”

He also spews an anti-Black racial slur at the victim, who is white, plus two derogatory sexist slurs.

The man then appears to stab and slash the tires of a bicycle in front of the building before storming off, the video shows.

The victim, who can be seen in the video wearing a tallit, or Jewish prayer shawl, and yarmulke, is identified as a “bochur,” or yeshiva student, by Crown Heights Shmira, a neighborhood volunteer patrol.

Best lives in the Bronx, according to police.

In a separate incident, also on Wednesday, a man was arrested for beating up a 66-year-old rabbi on Dahill Road near Cortelyou Road in Borough Park around 9:30 p.m., police said. Cops arrested Eric Avrutov, 31, and charged him with assault, criminal obstruction of breathing and harassment.

The victim was taken to Maimonides Medical Center in stable condition.

It was not immediately clear if the incident was antisemitic. It is not being investigated as a hate crime at this time, police said.

“Last night, a Rabbi was attacked in Boro Park and a Yeshiva student was chased by a knife-wielding man screaming “Heil Hitler” in Crown Heights,” Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso posted on X on Thursday.

“I’m appalled by these horrific antisemitic acts. Brooklyn must be safe for all — we cannot tolerate attacks on our Jewish neighbors,” Reynoso wrote.

The number of hate crimes in the five boroughs has increased by 15% so far this year compared to at this point last year, with 58 additional confirmed incidents, according to NYPD statistics. Of the 45 confirmed hate crimes in August, 19, or 42%, were antisemitic incidents.

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