NEW YORK _ The blood-covered suspect nabbed in Harlem for the anti-Semitic Chanukah stabbing in Monsey, N.Y., has been ordered held on $5 million bail.
Grafton Thomas, who lives in Greenwood Lake about 20 miles from Monsey, was charged with five counts of attempted murder and one count of burglary. He pleaded not guilty during his arraignment just before noon Sunday in Ramapo town court.
Thomas, 37, was covered with blood he had tried to remove with bleach when cops caught up with him after the attack _ and a bloody machete was recovered from his car, according to prosecutors and police sources.
He was ordered held on $5 million bail by Judge Rhoda Schoenberger and is due back in court Friday.
Thomas, sporting a shaggy beard, said nothing during his court appearance.
His lawyer, Christine Ciganik, said in court he has no criminal record. Lohud.com reported he was hit with menacing and reckless endangerment charges last summer in Greenwood Lake but those charges were to be dismissed if he stayed out of further legal trouble.
Prosecutor Michael Dugandzic urged the judge to hold Thomas without bail but the judge said the state's new prison reform laws prevent that, according to lohud.com.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Sunday morning visited with the rabbi who hosted the Chanukah celebration.
"It's a very sad situation," Cuomo told reporters afterward.
"When he talks about what happened it's even more frightening than the reports you read in the newspaper."
Thomas, armed with a machete, allegedly entered the home in Monsey's Forshay neighborhood around 9:50 p.m. Saturday and stabbed five people. Three were treated and released while two remain hospitalized, one in serious condition with a skull fracture, authorities said Sunday.
"Inexplicable," Cuomo said of the bloodshed. "Nothing said, just hate. Hate and violence, that's all it was."
The stabber tried to make a run from the rabbi's home to a synagogue next door _ but someone locked the door to keep him from going inside.
A witness who recorded the suspect's license plate and alerted authorities is credited with helping make the quick arrest possible.
License plate readers picked up the Nissan Sentra crossing the George Washington Bridge just after 11 p.m. Saturday and NYPD cops nabbed the suspect in Harlem.
Thomas lives with his father, who has an auto body shop, sources said.
Cuomo vowed to push for a first-in-the-nation new state law that would allow suspects in similar cases to be charged as domestic terrorists.
"Just because they don't come from another country doesn't mean they're not terrorists," Cuomo said. "They should be prosecuted as domestic terrorists because that's what they are."
There have been 13 anti-Semitic crimes reported across New York state since Dec. 8, officials said.
"I wish I could say it was an isolated incident," Cuomo said. "This is a national phenomenon we're seeing and it's frightening."
"It is an American cancer that is spreading in the body politic," he added. "Once we become intolerance of differences then we are intolerant with America. Because America is all about differences. We're all from someplace else."
