The suspect in the sexual assault of a 9-year-old girl he allegedly kidnapped from a Queens supermarket as she shopped with her grandmother a night ago died in a car crash while fleeing from officers, according to police.
The car, a silver Honda Civic sedan, was initially spotted by officers around 12:30 p.m. Friday near 212th Street and Hillside Avenue in Queens Village, police said in a Friday evening press conference. Officers tried to pull the car over, but the driver refused and sped off, blowing through a stop sign and smashing into another car in the process.
The driver of the car was seriously injured in the T-bone crash and officers attempted to perform life-saving measures on the man.
“The police officer was saying [to] that guy, ‘Show me your hands, show me yours hands,'” said witness Ashik Amin, who was at home when he heard the crash and raced outside. “He wasn’t responding or anything. He wasn’t moving. And then they were trying to give him CPR for more than five minutes and no response.”
The driver was taken to New York-Presbyterian Hospital, where he died, according to police.
That driver was identified as Wayne Noel, the same person suspected of sexually assaulting a young girl he allegedly kidnapped from a Queens grocery story Thursday evening, police said. The girl went to the Key Food store on Queens Boulevard around 7 p.m. with her grandmother, with the suspect already inside.
As the grandmother stepped away for a moment to use the bathroom, police said the 64-year-old Noel went up to the girl and told her “get in front of me,” then grabbed her hair and forced her to leave the store with him. Noel then pushed her inside his car — the same one involved in Friday’s crash.
He drove away and sexually assaulted the girl, according to police, until he was interrupted by a good Samaritan passing by. Noel then drove off once again with the girl still in the car, parked near the Key Food store he took her from, and once again sexually assaulted her, police said.
Afterward, Noel left the girl on the street and took off. It wasn’t clear how long the girl was gone, but emergency personnel took the girl to the hospital.
An NYPD task force was assembled Thursday night in an effort to find the suspect as quickly as possible. That clued officers in to look for the vehicle, which is why they tried to stop the car Friday.
At a press conference, NYPD Assistant Chief Jason Savino said the police investigation and attempted apprehension of Noel hopefully “gave just a little piece of dignity back to young survivor.”
Savino said Noel had four previous arrests, the most recent being a 2022 robbery that also took place on Queens Boulevard and involved the same car he used to abduct the young girl on Thursday. In the robbery, he allegedly approached a woman and forced her into the car while brandishing a knife. The woman in that incident was able to get away, however.
None of Noel’s previous arrests were for sexually related crimes, police said.
