The daughter of Diana Agudelo, the woman viciously beaten while riding her bike on Randall’s Island stared down the accused attacker in court on Wednesday just days after the victim began breathing on her own.
But Jiraud Miguel, the man charged with beating the 44-year-old museum worker last month as she pedaled home from work late at night, wouldn’t even look the victim’s distraught daughter in the eye, she said.
“He didn’t look at me, but I looked at him. I don’t think he even looked back once,” Stephanie Rodas, 21, told reporters after Miguel‘s arraignment in Manhattan Criminal Court on attempted murder and robbery charges.
“The first thing I thought was he seemed like just a normal person. Like, I would’ve walked past him and I wouldn’t have thought twice. And I wouldn’t even have known. How can someone that I wouldn’t even suspect cause this much harm to my life? And cause my world to stop spinning? I just kept asking why? I couldn’t understand. And I still don’t understand. She was just trying to get home from work.”
Agudelo has been hospitalized in critical condition since the unprovoked attack on May 16, when she was brutally beaten while biking home from her museum job.
Rodas said her mother took the same route from work every day.
A week later, cops arrested Miguel, a Randall’s Island shelter resident, who had been on parole for a 2011 rape conviction after a 12-year prison sentence.
Cops said ankle monitor data tied him to the scene. Miguel initially told police he found the victim near the water and called 911, but his story quickly fell apart, officials said.
An NYPD police chief, Joseph Kenny. called the beating Agudelo suffered “one of the worst” he’d ever seen.
Agudelo was transferred to Elmhurst Hospital where she was treated for numerous skull fractures, a puncture wound to her temple and multiple abrasions, according to Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg.
She experienced massive brain hemorrhaging that required multiple surgeries to remove a portion of her skull and brain to control intracranial swelling, he said.
“To this day, she remains severely cognitively impaired,” Bragg said in a statement. “This conduct is abhorrent. I hope she continues to recover from this terrifying assault, and I want to assure New Yorkers that we will ensure accountability for those who commit such acts of violence.”
Rodas said her mom started breathing on her own last week, but still has a long road to recovery.
“She’s breathing through a hole around her neck,” Rodas said. “The only thing that doctors are saying is that she is getting an excess amount of fluid to her brain right now so they had to a mini-surgery where they put a tube through her spine, up to her brain to be able to take away that fluid. She’s been having fevers on and off, so there is an infection but they don’t know what was causing it.”
She said her mother is unable to speak.
“She’s been crying,” Rodas said. “She opens her eyes but she’s not fully conscious. She’s not fully able to look at me. And if she does look at me it’s no longer than just a minute before her eyes start drifting again.”
Rodas said she got emotional when she saw Miguel in the courtroom. She said it was important for her to represent her mother so that people know her mother is loved.
“She’s not alone, and that she’s not someone who people didn’t care about,” Rodas said. “I care about her. I just want justice.”
