Hayward BART station stabbing may have stemmed from fare dispute
HAYWARD, Calif. - A payment dispute at the Hayward BART station on Tuesday morning escalated into a stabbing, authorities said.
The incident occurred shortly after 10 a.m. near the entrance turnstile, where a rider who did not pay was confronted by another rider who had paid.
The confrontation resulted in one person being stabbed and transported to a local hospital.
BART officials said two people were detained at the station, but later let go as they were not involved in the incident.
The station was closed but later reopened in the early afternoon.
"There's a lot of crazy things everywhere, you know, but I feel there needs to be security everywhere more often," said rider Aaron King.
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Rider Jade Harris added, "I definitely keep my head on a swivel. I try not to be on my phone. I don't listen to music."
Despite Tuesday's stabbing, the latest numbers from BART police showed that through the end of August, overall crime was down 15% compared with the same period in 2023. The trend includes a 10% drop in violent crime, amounting to 236 violent crimes.
That means that for every 5,500 riders, one person was a victim of crime.
"I wouldn't have known if you didn't tell me that," Harris said.
The decline in the crime rate comes as BART has been experiencing an increase in ridership.
"I feel like a lot of the people who take BART, they kind of see it as a normal thing now. So, they tend to kind of just brush it off and don't report it. So I feel like it's a lot that's not reported," Harris said.
Rider David Marquez said, "Overall, from what I have seen the few times I have ridden it, it seems safe, but I know that there are still incidents like this occurring."
BART said that in 2024, 18% to 20% of riders reported seeing a visible increase in safety presence, up from 10% in 2023.