Why Didn’t NY Post Photographer Help Man Who Had Been Pushed Onto Subway Track?

December 5, 2012 by Hollywoodite

There was an uproar Monday about the New York Post. On the cover of which was the ominous title “DOOMED” and a photo of a man, a married father-of-one,  58-year-old Queens resident Ki Suk Han, who had been pushed onto the subway tracks immediately beforehand by an unidentified person.

Specifically, there was ire because freelance photographer R. Umar Abbasi stood idle long enough to take a photo as Han was run over by the oncoming train. Han sustained critical injuries and was later pronounced dead. The tragic photo covered the newspaper and was unfavorably compared to the notorious photo of an emaciated child being stalked by a vulture as taken by late photographer Kevin Carter (who later committed suicide apparently haunted by his works).

And today, critics are asking why didn’t Abbasi help? Well, he was a guest on The Today Show where he responded to criticism by basically saying he was “too far away” to be useful.

Abbasi also wrote a piece for the Post, saying “It all went so quickly.” According to Gawker, Abassi asserts that “the amount of time that elapsed from the moment he noticed Han on the tracks until he was struck by the oncoming train was 22 seconds… a figure that’s significantly less than the 60 to 90 seconds reported by a police source who spoke with DNAinfo.” Abbasi continues in the Post: “[Han was] too far away to reach.” Moreover, the assailant who pushed Han headed for Abassi who was ”afraid he might push me onto the tracks.”

Abassi continues, he only flashed his camera to warn the conductor and didn’t look at the photos: “I didn’t even know at all that I had even captured the images in such detail,” he writes in the Post. “I didn’t look at them. I didn’t want to.”

He told Today, he “was approached that there would be interest” so he licensed the photos to the Post. ”I would call it licensing to use it,” he explained. “Selling a photograph of this nature sounds morbid. I licensed these photographs. [How the image was used] is not my decision. I was on assignment. I don’t control what image is used and how it used and how it is presented.”