The woman power walker who was jumped and brutalized by a career criminal in Prospect Park expressed her heartfelt thanks yesterday to the hero cop who stopped her assault and wrestled her attacker to the ground.
“She said she’s grateful the officer was there,” said the woman’s father, who relayed the words she spoke in the Brooklyn hospital bed where she is recovering from a broken jaw, a damaged eye and other wounds.
“She said she feels he’s a hero,” the teary-eyed dad said in the waiting room at Kings County Hospital. “She recognizes it could have been far worse – and she’s looking forward to regaining her normal life again.”
The woman, whose name The Post is withholding, is a 33-year-old artist and clothing designer. She was attacked on a jogging trail near the Third Street entrance to the park about noon Tuesday. Bennie Hogan, 44, is accused of punching her, trying to pull off her pants and threatening to rape her.
But the attack was stopped by Officer Anthony Ward, a new scooter-patrol cop, who spotted the attacker punching the victim and gave chase. Ward was able to tackle the man and handcuff him – even though Hogan had a 50-pound advantage on him.
“Ward is a hero, unquestionably,” said the woman’s father, who traveled to Brooklyn from his home in Maine. “He was so alert, so brave. The Police Department in New York has to be congratulated.”
The victim is the oldest of six sisters, and she also has five half-sisters through her father. The dad, whose name is being withheld, said he was comforted to see so much support from friends who have visited her hospital bed over the past few days. Among the visitors was top model Frankie Rayder.
“We’re grateful for all of her friends’ prayer groups,” said the dad, a devout Catholic. “I was moved by it.”
Hogan, who has been arrested 18 times since 1985, was ordered held on $500,000 bail Wednesday.
He has been charged with counts including attempted rape and assault. His most recent arrest came in January, when he was given six months for groping a woman near a Brooklyn subway station.
In the latest attack, he allegedly punched the victim in the eye some 12 times, damaging it so badly she temporarily lost vision and will need reconstructive surgery.
“Her vision appears to be recovering,” the dad said. “There’s still more medical research that has to take place, but she’s moving in a positive direction.”
The dad said the attack has not made his daughter, who came to New York at age 18 to study art, want to leave the city.
“She said she’ll stay in New York because it’s her home,” he said.