FORDHAM, the Bronx (PIX11) – Derick Gardner is back home in the Bronx after being stabbed with a screwdriver while on an MTA bus Monday afternoon.
"He's all in my face, 'you heard what I said? That's annoying!' and he caught me in my head," Gardner recalled.
Gardner, 60, said he was on the BX22 bus in Fordham Center when a man suddenly attacked him with a screwdriver.
"I was humming a church song," Gardner said, apparently setting off the suspect's temper.
Gardner said the man, seemingly irritated by Gardner's humming and tapping of the seat, plunged the tool into the top of his head before bolting.
"A lot of women on the bus came and helped me. I'm grateful for it," Gardner said.
Ina Percival, who was working along East Fordham Road, described the commotion that followed.
"Everyone started coming out of the bus, they were screaming something happened," Percival said.
"I saw the guy bleeding. I came to the store and brought papers to put on his head," Percival said.
Gardner was rushed to the hospital, where doctors closed his wound with two staples.
A native New Yorker, Gardner said he has taken the bus all his life and won't stop now.
Gardner has this message to anyone who does the same:
"Watch your back, be safe, and God bless," he said.
Police have not made any arrests and are reviewing MTA surveillance video from the bus.
Submit tips to police by calling Crime Stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477), visiting crimestoppers.nypdonline.org, downloading the NYPD Crime Stoppers mobile app, or texting 274637 (CRIMES) then entering TIP577. Spanish-speaking callers are asked to dial 1-888-57-PISTA (74782).