Updated 03/13/2010 07:47 PM
Alleged Manhattan Assaulter Charged With Attempted Murder
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Authorities said Saturday that a Pennsylvania man who allegedly assaulted a woman in a Manhattan bar was charged with attempted second-degree murder.
The Manhattan district attorney's office said Mbarek Lafrem, 30, of Norwood, Pa., seen above, also faces charges of first-degree rape and first-degree assault.
The district attorney's office said that Lafrem was arrested Friday after telling authorities that he punched and pushed a 29-year-old nurse from Connecticut into a bathroom stall in Social Bar and Lounge on Eighth Avenue between 48th and 49th Streets early Thursday morning.
Lafrem told authorities he acted in self-defense.
The victim told police a man followed her into a stall in the ladies' room and beat her after she rejected his advances.
She was discovered unconscious and bleeding on the bathroom floor and was hospitalized with a broken eye socket, a broken jaw and other injuries.
Sources told NY1 the victim's rape kit came back negative.
Lafrem was turned in by co-workers on a construction job who recognized him in surveillance video released by police.