Manhattan DA drops murder charges against bodega clerk who defended himself during attack

The Manhattan District Attorney has dropped murder charges against the NYC bodega clerk who stabbed a man that was attacking him in defense. 

According to The Hill, on July 1 the Bodega Clerk, Jose Alba, was attacked by Austin Simon. Alba was working as a Clerk for Blue Moon Convenience Store in Manhattan when Simon, his 10-year-old daughter and girlfriend were doing some shopping.

As they were making there way toward the cash register, the family’s EBT card which was being used to purchase the items malfunctioned. Once Alba saw that the card malfunctioned, he reportedly snatched a candy bar from Simon’s 10-year-old daughter’s hand. 

After that interaction, Simon’s girlfriend and daughter left the Convenience Store along with Simon who followed behind. Shortly after, Simon returned and directly attacked Alba. During the altercation Alba grabbed a knife and stabbed Simon three times, which he later died from. The footage of the incident quickly went viral.

Alba was jailed for nearly a week at Riker’s Island, NBC New York reports. His bail had been set at a quarter of a million dollars, which prosecutors said was because Alba had previously made plans to travel out of the country after the incident. His bail was ultimately dropped to $50,000 and Alba was released under conditions that he surrender his passport, stay in the city and agree to electronic monitoring.

On Tuesday, prosecutors submitted a motion to dismiss the murder charges against Alba being that they couldn’t prove his deadly force was unjustified.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) said said on Tuesday after the murder charges were dropped, “We had an innocent hard-working New Yorker that was doing his job and someone was extremely aggressive towards him. And I believe after the DA’s review, the DA in my opinion made the right decision.”