An out-of-town attorney was abducted outside a Midtown Manhattan strip club and savagely beaten by four thieves who stole his Rolex watch and iPhone before dumping him in a New Jersey nature reserve, federal officials said Tuesday.
The victim, who was visiting New York for work, was lured from outside Rick’s Cabaret on W. 33rd St. near Sixth Ave. into a car by his kidnappers just before 4 a.m. on June 11, prosecutors said.
The crooks promised to give the victim a lift back to his hotel, only to then attack him once he was trapped inside the vehicle, according to Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jamie McDonald.
Dani Amanuel, Kenny Fetiere and Kibret Meles were charged Tuesday in the abduction. A fourth suspect involved in the plot has not been identified.
“The defendants carried out a calculated and vicious kidnapping—luring the victim into a waiting car in Manhattan, beating and robbing him as they drove through the Lincoln Tunnel, stealing his property, and abandoning him bloodied in New Jersey,” McDonald said.
Prosecutors said that the suspects spotted their victim while he was having dinner the night of June 10 and began chatting him up.
The thieves encouraged him to go to the strip club, where they got him very drunk, prosecutors said.
When the night was over, the suspects took the victim to their Hyundai, promising a ride back to his hotel, officials said. But instead of bringing him back, they headed to the Lincoln Tunnel and restrained their victim.
The crooks beat him savagely, at one point slashing him with a machete, while demanding his iPhone password, officials said. They then took his property and dropped him off in a nature preserve in West Orange, NJ, prosecutors said.
The victim had to be hospitalized for three days due to his injuries, which included four broken bones around his eyes and a gash on his finger that required stitches. A photo taken of the victim following the attack shows him covered in blood, which almost completely stained his light blue polo shirt crimson.
Fetiere and Meles were arrested Tuesday morning, while Amanuel remained at large.
The defendants were each charged with kidnapping and conspiracy to commit kidnapping, each of which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison, officials said.
With John Annese