Drama on the Subway!

I was on the A train going downtown to work this morning and one of the professionally homeless types was working his way through the car, holding a sign and saying his spiel.  I've actually never seen this particular guy before (there is a crowd of regular panhandlers on the A) but I could tell from the tone of his voice he was bad news--he had that edge that said "I'm one rejection away from spewing profanities" and he was asking every person personally "hey, can you give me something?  A few pennies, a nickel? Can you give me something?"  EVERY single person.  I was prepared to ignore him.  Well he went further than profanities--right in front of me, he hauled off and socked a guy, a college student, screaming "Fucking faggot! Don't look at me like that!"  He kept trying to hit the guy again and they ended up literally RIGHT in front of me, I thought they were going to end up on my lap.  About 10 passengers jumped the homeless guy and pulled him off.  He kept trying to fight and some prudent person pepper-sprayed him in the eyes. (My pepper spray was buried with my keys at the bottom of my bookbag.)  His eyes streaming, the asshole was staggering around saying "I'm a victim of sexual assault!  Fucking faggot!"  Everyone was prepared to pound the shit out of this guy.  He went to the next car but luckily we were near the 59th St. station--as soon as the train stopped, a bunch of us ran to the conductor and told him to call the transit police and arrest the guy.  I don't know if they caught him but I gave a detailed description, saying "you can't miss him, he has a sign asking for money, he's streaming from the eyes and he has on loose tan shorts and a button-up short-sleeved tan shirt."

The guy he attacked was wearing a tee-shirt saying "NYU Wrestling" and he LOOKED like a wrestler, huge chest.  Homeless asshole is probably lucky he didn't really get his clock cleaned--I assure you no one on the train would have stepped in to stop it, had THAT happened.  As Hermione would say "What. An. Idiot."

Too many crazy losers on the train.