A woman told cops she was raped in Central Park early Sunday morning by a brute who asked her for directions and then dragged her into a wooded area.
The victim, 28, said she was walking through the park’s northeastern corner when her assailant attacked at around 4:30 a.m., law-enforcement sources said.
Afterward, she went to Mount Sinai Hospital and called 911, sources said.
Crime-scene investigators spent hours searching for evidence, scouring an area about the size of a football field near Fifth Avenue and 102nd Street that was cordoned off with yellow tape.
Detectives from the Special Victims Unit also interviewed the victim, a Russian immigrant who works in a restaurant and lives in Washington Heights, sources said.
One source noted inconsistencies in her account, including surveillance video that showed her walking on Fifth Avenue with a man she didn’t mention in her initial report.
It was unclear if that man is the same one she said raped her.
The woman’s report came just weeks after a 24-year-old missionary was raped inside NYU’s Catholic Center by a fiend who forced his way into the building after stalking the woman for several blocks before dawn on Oct. 31.
Additional reporting by Daniel Prendergast and C.J. Sullivan