Man Kidnapped In Coney Island Was Convicted Murderer In Debt To Assailants

When a 68-year-old man wound up at Lutheran Medical Center last Friday with stab wounds to his back and head, cops didn’t realize they had a convicted murderer with a long rap sheet recouping in the hospital bed with non-life threatening injuries.

Officers originally believed that the man — identified as Donald Wallace — was dragged into an SUV by two thieves looking for cash.

Cops first reported that on Friday, December 30, at approximately 1:30am, Wallace left the Pay-O-Matic located at 2323 Mermaid Avenue near West 24th Street, and was submitted to a frightening four-mile ride from Coney Island to Sheepshead Bay.

After the suspects kidnapped Wallace, cops say they stabbed him once in the head, three times in his back, and then drove him four miles away, dumping him at the corner of Avenue W and Nostrand Avenue.

According to the Daily News, police were skeptical of Wallace’s story. And their instincts were spot on.

Wallace later admitted that he owed the attackers money, and was brought to the Pay-O-Matic by the suspects to withdraw cash to pay them back. However, his ATM card did not work in the machine.

Cops say the two suspects then drove Wallace to another ATM machine, which is when the situation escalated.

During that trip, Wallace told cops he fought back, which prompted the two suspects to stab and rob him. During the altercation, the 68-year-old was able to escape the SUV at the corner of Avenue W and Nostrand Avenue in Sheepshead Bay.

The Daily News reported that Wallace had served 20 years in prison for a Bronx murder conviction and was paroled in November 1992. In addition to the murder, he was convicted of robbery and weapons possession.

Wallace’s parole supervision finished in April 2016.

The police have not yet released a detailed description of the suspects.

Anyone with information in regards to this incident is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS or for Spanish 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).The public can also submit their tips by logging onto the Crime Stoppers Website at WWW.NYPDCRIMESTOPPERS.COM or texting their tips to 274637(CRIMES) then enter TIP577.