Police released a photo of a fourth suspect in the wild subway beatdown of Fox News meteorologist Adam Klotz — who revealed in a new interview how members of the violent crew egged each other on to “put him to sleep.”
The surveillance image, released by the NYPD Monday night, shows a young-looking man in a black jacket and light sweater. The suspect is still on the loose and believed to be connected to the brutal early Saturday attack on Klotz, 37, on a southbound No. 1 train near 18th Street.
Three of the suspects — two 15-year-olds and a 17-year-old — were arrested soon after the attack and then released, cops said.
“This whole group comes and gang-rushes me, jumps on me and just starts beating me and kicking me,” Klotz recalled in a Monday night interview with Fox News host Tucker Carlson. “I hear, ‘Put him to sleep, put him to sleep, put him to sleep, put him to sleep.’ They wanted to knock me out.
“And my goal at that point — it’s just like, cover my head, because once you’re unconscious, who knows what’s going to happen?” added the weatherman, whose face was still bruised from the attack. “And I was able to avoid that, but I got kicked up and down the side, kind of stomped on. They got their licks in for sure.”
Klotz said the mayhem began as he headed home from watching the Giants game at a bar with friends.
He felt compelled to intervene, he said, when he witnessed the crew setting a senior’s hair on fire.
“A group of I’d say like seven teens, one started to light up a joint, and with the lighter still in his hand, just put a live lighter in an elderly man’s hair and it blew up like a matchbook,” Klotz said. “His entire head was on fire. And the guy’s knocking out his [hair].”
“I was just sitting right there watching it and how can you not [intervene]?” Klotz recalled. “[I said], ‘Whoa, guys, you can’t do that.’ And then they just did not want to be told what they could or couldn’t do. So then suddenly the focus was on me.”
The suspects asked him if he had a problem before Klotz repeated, “You can’t do that,” he said.
One of them sneered, “Try to stop me,” according to the weatherman.
“So I caught a left, a pretty good left [that] kind of put my head back into the wall,” Klotz said.
Klotz said he moved to another car — thinking the worst was over — but the same group found him and attacked him again a short time later.
The three young thugs who have already been released with “juvenile reports” could only face charges if Klotz files a complaint with the city Department of Probation, which would then decide if it would refer the case to the Law Department, officials said Sunday.
The juvenile reports they were given are handed to youngsters who allegedly commit an act that would constitute an offense if perpetrated by an adult.
However, police said Monday they’re interviewing the elderly man who was allegedly accosted by the teens first — and could still lodge charges against the rowdy crew.
“The decision was to get all the information before we move forward,” NYPD Deputy Chief Kevin Maloney told The Post. “The decision was made to release them to their parents and make efforts to identify the other victim, which we did.”
“We’re talking to him now to see if there are appropriate charges,” Maloney said. “They could be issued appearance tickets to appear in family court.”
Asked on “Fox & Friends” earlier Monday if he would pursue charges, Klotz was noncommittal.
“I want someone to be held responsible, but really what I want is some sort of change. I don’t want this to happen to somebody else, and I don’t think necessarily just these kids getting in trouble,” he said. “Like, where’s the structural things?”
“I want [Mayor] Eric Adams to do something more long-term that this won’t happen to somebody else, more than me just getting some sort of revenge in the short term,” he said.
