A person walking through a Midtown Manhattan subway tunnel used a brick to destroy 10 digital ad screens, police say, and now he's wanted for criminal mischief.
The incident occurred on Tuesday, August 26th, at about 3:48 a.m. According to the NYPD, "an unidentified male removed a brick from his backpack and smashed ten advertising screens" at the 42nd Street-8th Avenue station.
The suspect then fled the station.
Authorities say the amount of damage is "assessed at approximately $30,000."
The MTA started rolling out digital ads in train cars and stations in 2017. Earlier this year, the agency announced that 53,000 more would be added, across the subway and commuter lines; the Daily News reported, "The agency was guaranteed $115 million last year from digital ads and expects to get $117 million this year in its deal with Outfront, the company that will install and run the screens under a 10-year contract."
"We have in effect lots and lots of New Yorkers whose eyeballs we can sell to advertisers,” MTA construction chief Janno Lieber said.
This morning, MTA spokesperson Shams Tarek explained that the screens are actually not strictly for advertising. "Note that our digital displays also show customer/system information like maps, service notifications, etc, i.e. they are not just for ads," Tarek said. He also confirmed that the digital displays, which offer "dynamic service information," are "a key component of a modern transit system, and the screens also generate far more revenue than static ads."
In April, dozens of LinkNYC kiosks were smashed by a vandal.
Anyone with information in regard to the identity of this male is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the CrimeStoppers website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM or on Twitter @NYPDTips.
Additional reporting by Stephen Nessen
