Stranger Shoved in Front of Tube Train Over Alleged ‘Dirty Look’

A man pushed a stranger in front of a Tube train because he thought he was given a dirty look, a court has heard.

Brwa Shorsh, 24, allegedly shoved postman Tadeusz Potoczek off the southbound Victoria line platform at Oxford Circus station on Feb 3 in an act of “shocking and random violence”, Inner London Crown Court was told.

Sam Barker, prosecuting, also told the court that “happily, tragedy was avoided” as Mr Potoczek did not fall on to the electrified rail and a passerby rushed to help pull him off the track.

The lights of the oncoming train could be seen from the platform but the experienced train driver, Robert Walker, spotted Mr Potoczek, who was wearing a bright red jacket, and hit the emergency brake.

Mr Barker said: “The prosecution say there is only one reason you would push someone in front of a train and that is to kill them.”

Mr Shorsh, of no fixed address, who listened to the hearing through a Kurdish interpreter, has pleaded not guilty to attempted murder and also denied an alternative count of attempted grievous bodily harm.

Mr Potoczek was on his way home via central London and looking up at a notice board when the incident happened.

He noticed Mr Shorsh was sitting on a bench and was not moving and appeared not to be getting on or off a train, but seemed to be lying down and sleeping.

Mr Barker said: “Without a word of explanation [or] sort of provocation, [Mr Shorsh] leapt up and shoved him hard.”

Mr Potoczek fell from the platform and “to his horror a train was coming into the station – it was actually at the mouth of the entrance and because he stayed on his feet and [with] the quick-thinking member of the public [there] he was pulled out.”

The prosecution claimed that the defendant knew there was a train coming and Mr Shorsh was heard shouting “what the f— are you doing here?”

Victim ‘seconds away from death’

The train was travelling at 60kph (38mph) and two of its eight carriages entered the platform.

The court was told that the driver felt Mr Potoczek had a lucky escape as the lines were live.

Mr Barker said: “He [the driver] felt that if he [Mr Potoczek] had been on the tracks a few seconds later, he would have been killed.

“If he [the driver] had looked away for a few seconds, he [Mr Potoczek] would have been killed.

Mr Shorsh was arrested later that afternoon at Warren Street station and told officers during his police interview he had pushed Mr Potoczek because “the man had given him a dirty look and he felt disrespect”, the court was told.

Mr Barker added “he said he knew the rail was electrified and that it was extremely dangerous” but that “disrespecting him was dangerous”.

The court heard Mr Shorsh had felt that three women had previously been rude to him when he thought that Mr Potoczek had “given him a look”.

Mr Barker added that Mr Potoczek “did not look at him whatsoever – it is the stuff of nightmares and he just felt himself being pushed in front of a train”.

The trial continues.