U.S. News & World Report There have been nearly a dozen random slashings reported around New York City since December, including three this week on subway trains “They want to create anxiety, to feel powerful, to laugh at the results,” said criminologist Jack Levin of Northeastern University, who studies the crime. There has been an uptick in knife attacks citywide the past few months, but police statistics don’t distinguish between random and targeted attacks. And overall crime is near modern-era lows.