Late Sunday night, very few people were headed through to the Herald Square subway platform in New York City. Headed to work, home or wherever – just wanting to get where they’re going, safely, quickly, no hassles. Don’t look at anyone, get on the train.

A 76-year-old travel planner was part of that movement – on the stairs heading down to the platform. He often worked late, but was at a station he normally didn’t use, having to drop mail off at the boxes that were there. One of the ubiquitous vagrants hanging around the entrances hit him up for money as he started down the staircase. The older fellow refused.

…The stabber 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. But he wasn’t through.

Monday afternoon, the same assailant was back on the subway and busy reaching out to touch someone again.

…Then around 2:50 p.m. Monday, Trotman punched a 42-year-old man multiple times on a northbound A train approaching 23rd Street, cops said.

NYPD finally caught up with the man they identified as David Trotman near Times Square. Unsurprisingly, he has a mile long rap sheet and they were able to pin yet another assault on him.

…Cops caught up to him at the Times Square station, where he was arrested and charged with misdemeanor assault, the sources said.

Police said they then linked Trotman — who has a slew of arrests dating back to at least 2017 — to the attack on Ahmed a day prior.

Trotman was also charged Monday with forcible touching for allegedly grabbing the buttocks of a 21-year-old woman walking at Wall Street and William Street in Lower Manhattan back on July 12, cops and sources said.

He’s also a mental case of epic proportion, according to court papers, and illustrated by every account of his rants during his arrest.

“Caucasians are ignorant people,” he ranted when a Daily News reporter asked about the stabbing. “They suck d— in their sleep. That’s what happened.”

Speaking of court papers, they’ve had to treat mailings from this individual with gloves. And sanitizer, He likes to smear things on official documents.

…David Trotman, 38, charged early Tuesday with wounding a 76-year-old travel agent at the Herald Square subway stop, once denounced gay inmates as “pink poodles,” with federal court documents further alleging he sent envelopes smeared with feces and blood to a prosecutor.

“Beyond the simply disgusting nature, this practice is dangerous and creates a health hazard,” the court papers stated, adding that the scanner used to record the documents needed to be sanitized by hand.

A relative thought he’d been diagnosed in 2010 “They found out he was schizophrenic or whatever,” and had spiraled out of control thereafter. One police officer reported about trying to interview Trotman while he was in the hospital prior his 2017 conviction on unauthorized vehicle use charges, and the man had been unable to speak.

…The cop described the defendant as “incapacitated and (he) could not remember due to poly-substance dependence disorder,” court papers read.

The suspect also sent along a bloodstained change of address letter in 2018 during a case in which the court records were “replete with Mr. Trotman’s inappropriate rantings,” authorities said.

…Previous court papers included a warning over Trotman’s vile mailings, noting he would face “more significant and serious sanctions.” The court clerk cited “sanitary concerns” and said anything mailed by the defendant unrelated to the case “will be destroyed and disposed of without further review.”

Trotman’s been on the streets in between serving a couple years in prison for the vehicle charge.

Unstable as he is, it has to be terrifying to have him appear on your lawn. And know he’ll be turned loose to come back.

…Trotman is also wanted in Queens for two separate orders-of-protection violations from earlier this month, the sources said.

In the first case, from August 6, he stood on the front lawn of the same Queens Village home where he allegedly damaged the shed door — and threw a bucket of urine onto the front window, the sources said.

Then on Saturday, he returned to that home and threw an unspecified liquid onto the victim’s driveway, according to the sources.

Sure would be nice to be able to have a firearm for protection in New York City, especially under those circumstances – wouldn’t you think?

And now an elderly man is recovering from being nearly stabbed in the heart because he wouldn’t give the homeless guy on the steps a hand out.

…The travel planner recalled stumbling down the stairs to the mezzanine, blood pouring from the wound.

“I thought maybe everything was OK, but then I went down to the platform and saw blood.”

Daily News reporters interviewed the 76-year-old victim of a stabbing attack outside the Herald Square station at 11:30 p.m. Sunday.

He was still in a bed at Bellevue Hospital when they met him today, hours after he had undergone surgery.

His name is Iqbal Ahmed, and he works… pic.twitter.com/VHMf2JQIpJ

— Crime in NYC (@CrimeInNYC) August 15, 2023

As Mr. Ahmed, who seems much smarter than the mayor, worries:

…“This is not good for the city, tourists will be scared!” he told the New York Daily News on Monday from Bellevue Hospital.

I don’t think it’s just tourists the city should worry about.