Woman Throws Girl Onto Railroad Tracks In New Jersey

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

A New Jersey woman, Autumn Matacchiera, remains in detention and under psychiatric evaluation after police officers reportedly saw her lasso a 5-year-old girl in front of a train approaching the Burlington, NJ station on Friday by the night.

Matacchiera, 20, of the city of Hainesport, faces one count of attempted murder, Burlington Police Department Captain John Fine told People magazine. In an interview with NJ.com, Matacchiera's mother, Laura Matacchiera, said that she had "never hurt anyone." She also explained that her daughter had been "in and out" of mental health institutions for the past six years.

The strange event happened on Friday night when police officers went to the train station after being alerted to the presence of a suspicious woman. As they approached Autumn Matacchiera, she allegedly grabbed the little girl - who was waiting for a train with her mother and her boyfriend - and pushed her onto the rails just as the train approached.

The mother's boyfriend rescued the girl as officers used their flashlights to signal the train driver to stop. Fortunately, the little girl survived the fall that left her a facial cut and several bruises.

As reported in the press, neither the girl's mother nor her boyfriend knew Matacchiera. "As parents, we are grateful that she is doing well," Laura Matacchiera told NJ Advance Media Sunday about the little girl her daughter would have pushed. Her own daughter, added Laura Matacchiera, is not a criminal, but a girl who suffers from mental problems who has been released from various institutions despite the fact that her family has opposed being released.

In fact, Autumn Matacchiera recently launched a blog in which she admitted that she suffers from anxiety, autism and bipolar disorder, and assured that she was writing it to "help other people". Since she is still hospitalized, she has not appeared before a judge to face the charge against her; The court records also do not indicate whether she has legal representation. "Maybe she was in the middle of a crisis when she did this," Fine said.