Patrons at an Art Basel event in Miami obliviously watched a woman being stabbed on her arms and neck Friday night, thinking it was performance art.
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The victim of the stabbing (her name not yet released) confronted the perpetrator, Siyuan Zhao, about purposely following her around the art show and bumping into her several times.
Some reportedly believed the police tape that cordoned the area off after the attack was part of the exhibition.
The unidentified victim was transported to a local hospital, with a police spokesperson stating her injuries were not life threatening.
“Miami Beach Police Officers tried to talk him down, but [he] just wouldn’t cooperate”, Johnson said in his posting, which had hundreds of comments and about 60 likes.
The stabbing occurred in a corridor near an art installation entitled “The Swamp of Sagittarius”, by Miami artist Naomi Fisher. Someone else also showed her a cellphone picture of the victim, dressed in white and covered in blood stains. She told the Miami Herald one witness thought it was a performance with fake blood until he realized the blood was real. One witness told the Herald she heard the victim scream, and saw the victim lying on the ground bleeding with what appeared to be a pen in her neck. “Then I see police, I see someone on the floor”, said Perez.
The city’s police has said the man was suspected of attempting to rob a Bank of America branch just before 10.30am, just blocks from some of the city’s most popular tourist destinations of South Beach and the Art Deco district.
Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine called the shooting a “horrible, isolated incident and tragic for everyone involved”.
Zhao was arrested immediately by a Miami police officer whom she made a shocking confession to. “Our thoughts are with the victim”.
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When Miami Beach police got near the bank, the man fled, eventually running into a nearby barbershop.
