Lending a helping hand in queens is a good way to get stabbed

I think that there is a special, embarrassing place in hell reserved for about 20 or so people from Queens.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/queens/passers_by_let_good_sam_die_5SGkf5XDP5ooudVuEd8fbI

The above is a link to a story about an act of heroism, for which the hero was rewarded with several stab wounds to the chest, a heaping load of ingratitude, many an indifferent passing stare, a spot in a cellphone photo archive, and ultimately a hasty trip to the spirit world.

At about 5:40 in the morning, a woman was being attacked. Her unlikely savior was a homeless man, who was then stabbed in the chest several times for his efforts. The assailant ran off one way, and the woman another. The homeless man then stumbled a few feet after his attacker, and collapsed face down upon the ground.

At this point, he lay there in a pool of blood for an hour and twenty minutes, before firemen arrived to find he was dead.

There is a surveillance tape which documents his fall to the ground, and then records over twenty people walk by, and simply glance at him while he bleeds out on the pavement.

One despicable asshole even has the audacity to walk out of a nearby building, snap a photo with his phone camera, and then walk away. Nobody called 911. Nobody stopped to help.

Nobody.

For one hour and twenty minutes, this guy bled out on the pavement. One hour, and twenty minutes.

I can understand that, upon seeing a bleeding, dying man on the ground early in the morning, one may feel a little nervous about sticking around to help out. That much may not be right, but it is understandable. However, it would probably be pretty far fetched to speculate that even two or three of those twenty plus passers by didn't have a cell phone. How hard is it to walk to a point where one feels safe, and make a call?

And this woman who was the original, intended victim? Where the hell did she go? And clearly she knew that there was some form of a scuffle which ensued between the attacker and the homeless man, so why wouldn't she, at the very least, call 911 after she escaped and report what occurred?

There is so much that is disturbing about this story. What does this say about the general state of humanity? That not even one amongst twenty people is willing to even so much as make a phone call? I realize that this same sort of thing occurred about 45 years ago with Kitty Genovese, but man, I thought maybe we had progressed as human beings since then. The indifference is astounding.

I don't care what instinct or fear dictates--if I encounter a bleeding person on the ground, I'm doing something about it.

So I guess the lesson we learn here--you better think twice before being a homeless hero in Queens.