Jewish NYC Man Demands Justice for Wife Killed in Hit-and-Run by Alleged Antisemitic Vandal
Michael Trager was stunned, sitting on the ground, feeling his body for serious injuries.
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I guess I’m alive, he thought, miraculously. Then, the panic set in.
“Where’s Cara?” he cried urgently. “Where’s Cara?”
Then he saw her. His 71-year-old wife was lying on the ground — face down on the pavement — and she wasn’t getting up.
Michael rushed over, fearing the worst. Though it was several days later before doctors officially declared his wife dead, Michael insists she died right there on the street. And he didn’t even get to say goodbye.
“This is not the way people die,” Michael told National Review. “I lose a wife from 47 years, almost 50 years. We had an excellent marriage.”
Michael and Cara Trager had been headed home from dinner, walking down Union Turnpike in Queens, N.Y. It was Memorial Day.
A car turned onto the turnpike. The driver, Dawood Faisal, had been doing doughnuts on the intersecting Francis Lewis Boulevard. Already speeding well above 35 miles per hour, he accelerated to 75 miles per hour on the turnpike and ran a red light.
There was the sound of metal on metal as the 2013 Toyota Prius collided with two other cars. The Tragers were hit by one of two cars Faisal had struck. One moment, they were crossing the sidewalk. The next moment, they were on the ground. Both were transported to the hospital immediately. Faisal tried to flee and attacked bystanders with a tree branch before he was detained.
District Attorney Melinda Katz called it “manslaughter and assault.” Michael said it was more: one of many recent hate crimes committed against Jewish New Yorkers.
“He helped destroy my life, ultimately, and he’s hurt my children,” Michael said.
Given Faisal’s history, his choice of neighborhood to go on a hit-and-run spree doesn’t seem accidental to Michael.
Weeks earlier, Faisal had been identified as the vandal who toppled nine metal plant stands and threw several fistfuls of dirt at Bagels & Co., a Jewish-owned, Israeli-flag-adorned kosher bagel shop in the Tragers’ neighborhood.
Faisal is believed to have returned to the shop on May 23, two days before the hit-and-run incident. Wearing traditional Islamic attire, he kicked down eleven metal plant stands and attempted to knock over a clay pot.
But it wasn’t until July 31 that Faisal was arrested by the New York Police Department Hate Crimes Task Force and arraigned for hate crimes connected to the bagel shop vandalism.
His next court date is set for September 8, and he faces a maximum of seven years if convicted.
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The Tragers’ case, however, was brought to the Queens Supreme Court first.
On June 17, 22-year-old Faisal was charged on ten counts of “manslaughter in the second degree, assault in the second degree, assault in the third degree, two counts of leaving the scene without reporting, reckless driving, menacing in the second degree, failing to stop at a steady red signal, driving in excess of the maximum speed limit and operating a vehicle at unreasonable speed,” according to a press release from District Attorney Katz.
If convicted, Faisal will serve a sentence of over 15 years in prison. Currently, he is being held in custody without bail in New York.
Notably, Faisal is not being charged with a hate crime for targeting a known Jewish neighborhood.
“Though he was not trying to necessarily kill Cara Trager or Angel Michael Trager, etc., by virtue of where he was acting insanely and going down the roads in the way that he did, was there a likelihood that damage would be caused . . . and would he be killing or injuring a Jewish person?”
Michael answered “yes” to both questions. “I’ve lived in this borough for 68 years, so I’m not new to this borough,” Michael told NR. “And in that area, it’s heavily Jewish. So there’s the likelihood that was what happened.” He said there were enough kosher restaurants and supermarkets to suggest that the surrounding neighborhood is heavily Jewish.
“Nobody who didn’t have hate would have done what he did on a quiet, suburban street,” Michael told NR. “We’re saying that the actions that occurred prior to this — his actions with the restaurant itself — is [sic] all part of his hate.”
Hate crimes against Jewish New Yorkers have been on the rise this year. The Jewish Chronicle reports that anti-Jewish crimes increased over 50 percent compared to early August 2025. The Wall Street Journal found that hate crimes against the Jewish community increased by 8.5 percent in New York City in 2026. Between January 1 and June 30, 2026, the New York Police Department reported that over half of the incidents it handled were against the Jewish community.
In the weeks leading up to the hit-and-run, nearby locations like the Rego Park Jewish Center and Congregation Machane Chodosh in the Forest Hills neighborhood of Queens, as well as homes and even a car, were targeted by a group of young people who spray-painted swastikas on them.
Michael said the authorities insist that this incident did not involve Faisal, but that he “[doesn’t] know what that means.” “Did they actually get the cell phone records to prove it?” he asked. “If they did, to what extent did they do this?”
He told NR that his goal was ultimately to highlight the “unfathomable” reality that Faisal could achieve bail on September 8.
Michael is frustrated with the lack of response from community leaders and even the New York City mayor.
After Mamdani was elected New York City mayor in November 2025, Michael suggested to his wife that they sell the house but she refused.
He says he saw the “writing on the wall.”
“I want justice to be served. I want to be an example to others that this is not the way and for people and for a community and elected officials to speak out against it,” he said. “Show compassion, so these things don’t happen again, and make it clear that this behavior is not acceptable and not tolerated.”
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