NYC man claims bus driver choked him — but he was the one arrested for the caught-on-video attack
A Brooklyn man claims a bus driver choked him in a caught-on-video attack – but he was the one who ended up in cuffs and facing career fallout from the publicity.
Malachi Houston, 27, said he was wrongly charged with attempted murder for the June 8 fight with driver Isaac Egharevba, 60, while he was riding on the B99 bus in the East New York section of Brooklyn, according to two legal notices mounted against the city.
Houston claims after a manhunt was launched against him by cops and surveillance photos of him were blasted out in the news for allegedly stabbing Egharevba in the neck, he lost his job as a delivery driver and he’s been unable to secure a new job since.
“I have my life on a stand still right now,” Houston told The Post in an exclusive interview. “I want to clear my name. I want the truth to come out.”
Houston filed two notices of claim last month against the city, the MTA and the NYPD — the legal precursor to suing city agencies. He will be seeking $30 million in damages for the alleged attack, wrongful arrest and prosecution, and for harming his reputation.
A minute-long surveillance video obtained by The Post appears to show Houston briefly lean over into the driver’s seat area of the bus before the transit worker bursts from behind his driver’s seat door into the main cabin.
The door smacks Houston before the driver puts one hand on Houston’s neck and pins him against the railing inside the bus while the two struggle against each other, the video shows.
The same day, the police and Egharevba’s union put out statements claiming the transit worker was stabbed during the altercation.
TWU Local 100 union said in a press release that Egharevba, a 17-year bus operator, “was violently attacked” and added he “was performing his duties as assigned, when an unknown assailant unexpectedly sliced him on the left side of his face.”
Houston — of Bedford-Stuyvesant — said he was forced to take the bus after leaving his son’s kindergarten graduation because the subway was down.
But people on the No. 3 shuttle bus became “irate” because of an “unexplainable route detour,” according to a Houston’s notice of claim.
“I noticed that he passed my stop,” Houston said of the driver. “I noticed other people were going up to him and there was some type of commotion on the bus because he was skipping stops.”
When Houston first asked the bus operator to let him off, he snapped, “Get out of my face,” Houston claimed.
Egharevba then “started screaming” at another passenger, prompting Houston to ask him again “why are you not stopping the bus? Are you trying to take us hostage or something?” according to Houston.
“He started cursing and calling us names and stuff,” Houston claimed. “I got upset and I cursed back at him too. We got into a verbal dispute.”
Then when the bus stopped, “I tapped the front of the bus like let me off … and that’s when he lunged out,” Houston claimed.
Houston said he reached into the driver area and tossed a piece of paper right before Egharevba unleashed on him — but he said he never tried to hit the driver.
“He busted out of the booth, he hit me with [the booth door] and started attacking me,” Houston said. “He started choking me. He pinned me up again the railing.
“I had a bottle in my hand. The bottle broke in the midst of him charging at me,” Houston said, explaining the broken bottle may have cut Egharevba in the scuffle.
Houston claims Egharevba “was choking me for about a minute” before he released him. Houston then ran to the back of the bus and forced the doors open and ran out, he said.
“I was panicking for my life at that moment,” Houston said.
Houston explained that eventually the police issued a warrant for his arrest so he turned himself in on July 8 and had to spend five days in Rikers Island before a grand jury declined to indict him and he was released on July 13.
If a grand jury doesn’t indict Houston by his next court date in October prosecutors will be forced to drop the case entirely, a spokesman for the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office confirmed.
“I was attacked by a bus driver, almost strangled,” Houston said. “And they framed me and made it seem like I tried to kill him.”
Houston said ever since the incident he’s been opting to take cabs and Ubers because “I’ve been scared to get on the bus.”
Houston is facing two other criminal cases in Brooklyn for a March 18 incident when he was allegedly found with fraudulent credit cards and for a May 15 reckless driving incident. Houston denies the allegations in those cases.
His lawyer Mark Shirian said he believes the video totally vindicates his client, who was simply defending himself against the assault.
Egharevba “lost his temper [and] he voluntarily got himself involved in a physical altercation,” Shirian said. “He got himself injured and he’s now blaming it on the passenger.”
Egharevba denied the allegations.
“He was the one who attacked me,” the bus driver maintained in a brief phone call. “Someone attacked me while I was doing my job.”
The MTA said “this incident is under review” and confirmed that Egharevba still works as a bus driver for the transit agency.
The city Law Department and the NYPD both declined to comment.
