Bus driver stabbed at Metro station

This is not original reporting. All information has been compiled from the Gazette article "Ride On Bus Driver Stabbed at Metro Stop" by C. Benjamin Ford and the ABC 7 News report "Bus Driver Stabbed by Passenger."

A Ride On bus driver was stabbed at the Shady Grove Metro station on Sunday, May 9, highlighting the need for more security measures.

Gino Renne, president of the county union that represents the transit workers, feels that the stabbing increases the need for more security on county buses. "You never know who is on that bus, what type of weapons they have and what state of mind they're in," Renne said, according to the Gazette.

Montgomery County Police have still not found the passenger who stabbed the 34-year-old bus driver in the upper left thigh. Police described the suspect as a light-skinned, black male in his 30s, five feet, seven inches tall, weighing approximately 170 pounds. He was last seen wearing a dark skull cap and gray T-shirt.

The driver, who has not been identified, received several stitches for the stab wound, but was released by the hospital Sunday afternoon, and a supervisor took him home. He had not returned to work as of May 12.

The attack occurred after the bus driver had pulled into the Shady Grove Metro station, located in Rockville, to drop off passengers, police said.

The last passenger to get off the Ride On bus asked for a transfer ticket, and when the driver opened the booklet, police said, the passenger tried to steal it from him. The driver struggled with the passenger and was punched in the face, according to the Gazette.

After getting off the bus, the passenger reached into his backpack and pulled out a knife. The driver tried to get back on the bus to escape, said Carolyn Biggins, the division chief of the transit service. The driver did not get the door completely closed in time and the passenger was able to get on the bus and stab him, Biggins said.

This March, bus drivers complained to County Council members that they feel unsafe against the growing number of assaults against them. The County Council's Public Safety Committee agreed with the drivers, and Ride On officials agreed to make some changes to their policies, according to the Gazette.

The county bureaucracy, however, has been slow to make the needed changes. For example, the county still has not set up donated cell phones for bus drivers to call 911, Renne said.

According to Biggins, the county expects to have the phones installed by the end of June. Once the cell phones are installed, drivers can call 911 directly instead of going through the transit dispatcher, Biggins said. Montgomery County has also installed security cameras on 42 of the 354 buses in the system and hopes to eventually have them on all buses, according to the Gazette.

According to a May 5 article in the Gazette, both bus drivers and union officials said that not enough action has been taken to improve security against bus passengers who physically and verbally abuse them. Police were called 54 times in the 2003 fiscal year.

"Our operators are very concerned about their safety," Renne said on May 11, according to the Gazette. "Both in their minds and in the minds of the union leadership, we don't believe their department is taking this seriously," Renne said.

Biggins said Montgomery County is trying to deal with the issue. Serious assaults on drivers occur five to six times a year. "Even one is too many," Biggins said. "We've done things to try to enhance the drivers' safety. But, in general, it's a fairly safe system."

Anyone with information about the stabbing should call the Montgomery County police at 301-279-1602.

The original Gazette article can be found here. The ABC 7 News report can be found here.