Weng Sor: U-Haul driver who mowed down 8 people in NYC had history of mental illness and violence
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK CITY: A man who injured eight people after ramming his rented U-Haul into a crowd of people on Monday morning, February 13, has had a history of mental illness and served time in prison, says his son and brother-in-law. 62-year-old Weng Sor smashed his truck into the sidewalk, hitting a cyclist, pedestrians, and a police officer in the Sunset Park district of Brooklyn. According to a report, after he was detained, he told the police that he "wanted to die."
NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said that Sor hit people along the road, creating at least seven different crime scenes. He told the police, "Shoot me. I'm not stopping," when they tried to pull him over. Among the victims, two are in critical condition, two are in serious condition, and four suffered minor injuries. Weng Sor's son has now claimed that his father was "emotionally disturbed" and homeless at the time of the incident and often skipped his medication.
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Weng Sor, who has previous criminal record, was sentenced to one to three years in a Nevada prison for stabbing his brother in Las Vegas in 2015.
What did Weng Sor's son say?
"Very frequently he'll choose to skip out on his medications and do something like this," said Stephen Sor, 30 in an interview with AP, outside his Brooklyn home. "This isn't the first time he's been arrested. It's not the first time he's gone to jail."
Stephen additionally claimed that he was not in frequent touch with his father and that Weng Sor lived with his mother in Las Vegas. He said that he was shocked to see his father in Brooklyn a week ago at midnight.
Weng's son termed his relationship with his father "rocky" and said that he had a long history of mental illness. He said that his father was frequently troublesome as he refused to take his medication properly. "I try to just distance, as long as he leaves us alone," he said.
#UPDATE: #Surveillance footage shows the moment the #UHaul truck seen striking Multiple people while one pedestrian manages to jump out of the way. In #Bayridge #Brooklyn. Suspect Weng Sor, a 62yr-old man with no prior arrests & a history of mental illness pic.twitter.com/OdJaQtqDAa
— Sn00pster 🎙️ (@sn00pdad) February 13, 2023
Weng Sor's brother-in-law speaks out
"He's a schizophrenic. He's crazy," Sor's brother-in-law, Daryl Singer told the New York Post. He added, "I always said he's probably going to kill himself one day, that's the way I saw it. He just doesn't know how to lead a normal life."
Singer said that Sor was unsafe to be out on the streets and was known to "make threats". "I'm not surprised by any of this," Singer said. "He belongs in an institution for the rest of his life… tied to the bed, away from everybody. Because he might freak out. He might just kill somebody."
The Las Vegas native said that Sor moved out of Florida several months ago. "The mother does all she can for him because she's all he's got. She's helped him out so much, renting a room for him and he screwed that up, getting kicked out of three different places that he's lived," Singer told The Post. "He used to work, and then what happened one day was he decided to get a bus ticket and go to Florida. And that was the last thing that I heard about him from anybody. None of the family members talk about anything he's done."
Singer said that Sor's family is "scared of him". "He's just whacked in his head. I don't know why. Everyone else in the family is normal. He's the only one that's not."
He added that Sor's behavior had been turbulent for many years. "We've gone out to dinner when he was living here and everything seemed normal at first," he recalled. 'He just doesn't take his meds for his problem, and he starts talking weird stuff — church and God and Satan, and everybody's gonna get killed pretty soon. His mother's telling him, 'Stop it,' and he just rambles on."
Police are still trying to find out a possible motive for Sor's such action and he has no criminal records in New York.