Two thugs viciously beat an elderly Staten Island couple just steps from their front door, police said yesterday.
The brutal assault occurred Sunday after Joseph Naimo and his 74-year-old wife, Linda, celebrated his 81st birthday at their 3J’s Variety Store on Victory Boulevard in Tompkinsville.
They left the store and walked a few steps to the door leading to their upstairs apartment.
A hulking man and his female cohort suddenly pushed them into the stairwell and knocked them to the ground.
The man punched and kicked Joseph, demanding, “Give me the money!” cops said.
Joseph, who is legally blind, offered his wallet and pleaded, “I don’t have any more. Look!” according to his granddaughter Gina Naimo, 29.
“He saw there was no money in [his wallet] and he started taking it out on my grandmother, beating on her,” Gina added. “My grandmother is the kind of woman that if somebody came in and wanted something and didn’t have money, she’d give it to him.”
Linda is in critical condition at Richmond University Hospital with a fractured skull, broken nose and broken jaw.
“My mother is not too good,” said her son, Rocco Naimo, 49, who suffered a black eye when he came to his parents’ defense.
Joseph is back home.
The Naimos have run the variety store for 50 years.