A 28-year-old man was busted for groping four women in two hours in separate Manhattan incidents, police said Friday.
Sobel Uribe was arraigned Thursday on charges of forcible touching and sexual abuse. He pleaded not guilty and was ordered held on $5,000 bail.
Uribe struck three times on Wednesday, starting at 12:05 p.m. when he went up to a 36-year-old woman at Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village and squeezed her thigh and buttocks, police said.
An hour later, at 1:20 p.m., a 22-year-old woman was grabbed on her buttocks by the suspect while walking on Rivington St. near Norfolk St. on the Lower East Side.
The third victim, 34, was grabbed on the buttocks 10 minutes later on St. Mark’s Place near Avenue A, with the suspect saying “Excuse me — I need some a–,” according to a court complaint.
The fourth woman, 41, was grabbed on her buttocks while walking on Broadway near Bond St. at 2:10 p.m., police said.
Sobel, who has mental health issues according to police sources, was similarly described by each victim. He was nabbed later in the day and identified himself in surveillance photos shown to him, the complaint said.
“That is me,” he said.
Sobel was also charged in a case for which he was being sought, a misdemeanor assault on Sept. 7 in which he allegedly punched a man and grabbed him by the neck during a confrontation on Madison Ave. and E. 32nd St.