A man arrested for attacking multiple people during Shabbat service at Midtown’s Central synagogue is now facing federal hate-crime charges, officials said Tuesday.
Larry Montes, 46, was charged with two counts of committing hate crimes and one count of damage to religious property resulting in bodily injury for Friday’s attack, according to the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office. He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison if convicted on the top charge.
The attack at Central Synagogue, part of which was caught on a livestream of the temple’s Shabbat service, outraged Jewish leaders and public officials, including Mayor Mamdani, who said he was “horrified” to learn of the attack.
“Our administration will always stand against bigotry in all its forms,” the mayor said. “We will use every tool at our disposal to confront antisemitism and keep Jewish New Yorkers — and all New Yorkers — safe.”
The Simon Wiesenthal Center, an international Jewish human rights organization, said attacks like this are caused when antisemitism is ignored and is “dismissed as exaggeration”
“For Jews in New York, the sanctuary of the synagogue is meant to be a refuge, not a place where faith and fear are forced into uneasy proximity,” the organization said in a statement. “Violence on Shabbat is never only about the victims in the room; it is an assault on the very possibility of Jewish life lived openly, together and without dread.
Montes called congregants at Central Synagogue “swine,” referred to himself as God, and screamed an anti-Black slur at a security guard before attacking two people at the temple, cops said.
He allegedly struck a 63-year-old Michele Anaberg-Poma, splitting her lip and sending her crashing to the ground, then yelled, “F–k you, n—-r!” at a 65-year-old Black security guard before spitting in the man’s face and headbutting him, prosecutors said.
Montes then tried to flee but security staff, an NYPD officer working a detail at the synagogue, and congregants stopped and restrained him, prosecutors said.
Ananberg-Poma posted on Instagram the night of the attack, remaining defiant despite Montes’ tirade.
“You will not punch out our Jewish light. You will not stand and cause harm to our eternal light,” Ananberg-Poma wrote. “We will continue to sing our prayers of peace, love, and joy while protecting the voices that lead us each week.”
“Our beloved Central Synagogue stands for all — stands so tall, a light, a light truly for all,” she added.
Montes was sitting with the congregation at the Lexington Ave. synagogue near E. 55th St. during Friday’s Sabbath service when he suddenly sprang up from his seat and stormed up the central aisle to the front of the synagogue about 6:10 p.m. toward the bimah, or raised platform where rabbis read the Torah.
“I am Hashem!” he yelled, using a Hebrew word that refers to God, as he rushed the rabbi’s platform, according to a criminal complaint.
A video posted on X.com shows the congregation reacting in shock as he pumps his fist and rants, “Do you know who I am?”
Two women performing a song by the front of the synagogue flee to safety as Montes reaches the bimah, spins around, and marches back down the aisle, this time escorted from behind by a security guard, the video shows.
Montes grabbed and threw two $10,000 candle holders to the ground, breaking them, and screamed at the congregation, according to prosecutors.
But congregants at the Midtown synagogue didn’t let the violence stop them from finishing the Shabbat service, according to Central Synagogue’s senior rabbi.
“It is a testament to the strength of our community that services resumed immediately, and we refused to let this disruption extinguish the spirit of Shabbat,” Rabbi Angela Buchdahl and Jon May and Marcia Caban, the temple’s respective president and executive director, wrote in an email to congregants.
Montes lives in Mott Haven in the Bronx.
His relatives called Montes a troubled man whose struggles have worsened since the recent death of his grandmother, who raised him.
“He’s not a racist,” Montes’ cousin, who wished not to be named, told the Daily News. “He just needs help.”
“He hasn’t been OK after our grandmother passed away,” the relative added. “Since he’s been alone, he’s been acting really weird. He’s been talking to us in the family, saying (weird things).”
“I told him to look for help,” she said.
The NYPD and Manhattan prosecutors charged Montes with state hate crime assault and criminal mischief charges after his arrest. At an arraignment late Saturday, a Manhattan judge ordered him held on $10,000 bail. He’s currently jailed on Rikers Island, awaiting his next court date.
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch called Montes’ attack “deeply painful.”
“A place of worship should never be a crime scene,” Tisch said on X Friday. “I understand the sanctity of this space and its meaning for congregants.”
“Central Synagogue is where I grew up,” she said. “In joy and in sorrow, it has always been a place of comfort and peace.”
Montes’ arraignment in federal court was pending Tuesday.
“An attack on a house of worship is an attack on the fundamental right to practice one’s faith safely, and our office will work tirelessly to ensure the defendant is held fully accountable as we continue to protect all communities from hate‑driven violence,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jamie McDonald said as he announced the federal charges against Montes.
Montes had been arrested three times for robbery in 2023 and 2019 before Friday’s arrest, police said.
He has two past misdemeanor convictions in New York — one from when he stole headphones from Best Buy and brandished a knife when security tried to stop him in 2024, the other from when he stole deodorant from a CVS store and punched a worker there several times in the head.
By the end of July, the NYPD had investigated 205 confirmed antisemitic hate crimes in the city — 16 more than this time last year.
The number of antisemitic hate crimes in the city makes up nearly two-thirds of the 360 hate crimes investigated in the city this year, officials said.
“Antisemitism is real and it’s increasing by the day,” Sen. Charles Schumer (D-New York) added as he thanked the NYPD for the quick arrest. “No American, regardless of their religion, should feel unsafe in a house of worship. We must come together to ensure that no space is left for these types of antisemitic beliefs or acts.”
“All New Yorkers and all Americans must be able to worship freely with no fear of danger for themselves or their families,” Schumer said.
