Manhattan beggar stabs stranger, 76, who declined to give him money

A panhandler stabbed a 76-year-old stranger who declined to give him money outside Manhattan’s Herald Square subway station, leaving the victim seriously wounded, police said Monday.

The stabbed asked the victim for a handout on the steps leading into the station at W. 35th St. and Sixth Ave. 11:30 p.m. Sunday — then stabbed him in the chest when he refused, cops said.

The victim stumbled into the Herald Square stop for help and was rushed by medics to Bellevue Hospital in serious but stable condition.

The attacker ran off and is being sought.

Crime in the subway system is down 4% this year but there have been a number of high-profile assaults, including a stabbing at the Times Square station last month and a fatal shove to the tracks at an Upper West Side station in January.

Subway crime soared 30% in 2022 but started declining the last two months of the year, with 1,200 more cops assigned underground, on top of the 1,000 that had been added to the system earlier in the year.