A female federal prosecutor was viciously attacked by a hulking, razor-wielding drug dealer in a Brooklyn courtroom yesterday – and was saved when the thug’s 72-year-old lawyer and others tackled him.
“He was going to slash her throat,” said defense lawyer Harry Batchelder, who, along with a court reporter and two marshals, slammed Victor Wright, 27, to the ground and grabbed an inch-long razor blade from him.
Wright was being led into the courtroom to be hit with two life sentences for his role in a ruthless drug-trafficking crew when he lunged at prosecutor Carolyn Pokorny, 38, grabbing her by the throat and pulling her to the ground as she screamed in terror.
“He came into the courtroom to attack her,” said Eugene Corcoran, head of the Marshals Service in Brooklyn.
“Why don’t you try me instead of her?” stenographer Ron Tolkin shouted at the cowardly criminal as he leaped on Wright, before the group fell to the ground in a heap.
Both the elderly lawyer and Tolkin, 60, are former military men who served in Vietnam.
“Thank God Harry and Ron were there,” said Judge Frederic Block’s courtroom deputy, Mike Innelli.
Pokorny, chief of the narcotics division, suffered bruising on her neck and was treated at a hospital.
It’s unclear how Wright got the blade into court. Inmates are typically searched both at the prison and at the courthouse.
Wright was convicted of drug trafficking in 2006 for serving as a driver in notorious drug kingpin Kenneth “Supreme” McGriff’s Queens crack-dealing crew.
Batchelder was sliced on his right wrist, but shrugged it off.
“It’s nothing,” he said. “I’m not a hero.”
Additional reporting by Alex Ginsberg