Man who pushed strangers onto train tracks found guilty of attempted murder
A man has been found guilty of two counts of attempted murder after pushing two men towards the tracks at London Underground stations.
Paul Crossley of East London was found guilty on October 5 for pushing the men in separate incidents.
Crossley first attempted to push 23-year-old Tobias French onto the tracks at Tottenham Court Road Station on April 27, British Transport Police said.
French miraculously caught himself before falling, just seconds before a train hurtled past the platform.
Later that day, Crossley, 46, pushed another man, 91-year-old Robert Malpas, onto the tracks at Marble Arch Station.
Horrifying CCTV shows the elderly man being violently flung head first from the station platform and can be seen lying underneath the tracks as other passengers frantically try and help.
Malpas, a former Eurotunnel boss who had been knighted in 1998, suffered fractures to his pelvis and a head wound after he fell onto the track.
He was saved by bystander Riyad El Hussani, who jumped onto the tracks to assist him.
El Hussani suffered burns to his hand from touching the electrified track.
Crossley was arrested shortly after the attacks and told officers: “I didn’t get much sleep last night.”
According to the BBC’s report, he had taken crack cocaine prior to the incident and apparently chose his victims randomly.
Crossley will be sentenced on November 9.
– with Storyful
