Whacko beats down NYC doorman, 71, who called him ‘sir’ as he pleaded for mercy

A whacked-out maniac beat down a beloved 71-year-old doorman who blocked him from trespassing in a Manhattan building – as the kindly worker still politely called him “sir” as he pleaded for his life.

Nicolaie Lica – known as “George” by residents of his building on West 88th Street – told The Post he was working in the lobby of the building around midnight March 8 when Moshe Dardashty, 29, strolled in and said he wanted to visit a seventh-floor apartment.

Lica – who had worked in the building since 1998 – initially directed Dardashty toward the elevator banks before he recognized him as a man that a coworker had warned him was not welcome on the grounds.

“I ran after him. I met him in front of the elevator. I told him, ‘Sir, I’m very, very sorry. I cannot permit you to go up,’” Lica said in an interview from his home in the Bronx on Wednesday.

That set off the unhinged Dardashty, who yelled at the doorman.

“Suddenly he jumped at me,” Lica said. “I don’t know why. I tried to go away from him but I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t get out of the building because he was in front of me.”

The victim said he tried to escape into the hallway at first – but then gave up and turned to face his attacker when he realized he couldn’t get away. 

“He jumped at me, pushed me and I fell down,” Lica said. “He picked up the metal ramp and threw it at me and it hit me on the left side of my face around my left eye and the bone under the eye broke, and the nose. After he threw the ramp he jumped on me. That’s how I think he broke my vertebrae.

“After he hit me so many times I said, ‘Stop, sir, it’s too much,’” the elderly victim recalled. “I called for help, ‘Help me, help me.’ Nobody heard me. I called out to God, ‘Stop him, please, he wants to kill me.’”

Cops and prosecutors said Dardashty also beat Lica with a broom, but the victim said the attacker apparently attempted to break off a broom’s metal stick – and abandoned the makeshift weapon when he failed.

Although the victim’s “face was full of blood,” he managed to call the cops before bystanders took the phone and spoke to police for him.

The victim was rushed to Mount Sinai West, where he was treated and later released but he remains bedridden and battered.

“I can’t open my left eye,” he said. “I’m hoping in two, three days I can. I have pain in my side, arm and back. I have problems with three vertebrae on the right side and I can’t pick up a glass of water with my right hand. I have to use my left hand.”

Lica’s wife, Pauna Lica, 62, told The Post she is now her husband’s constant caretaker, putting drops in his eye and giving him multiple medications.

“Someone asked my husband how many punches he took,” Pauna Lica said. “He said, ‘I don’t know, but I think it was 100.’ The guy was strong, only 29 years old. Maybe he was on drugs or drunk, I don’t know.” 

Dardashty, who lives just blocks from the scene, was arrested minutes after the beatdown and was charged with assault and attempted assault, according to a criminal complaint. 

He was arraigned the next day and ordered held on $50,000 bail, the DA’s office said. 

Since the brutal attack, one of the building’s tenants of nearly a decade, Constantin Schoelkopf, launched a GoFundMe page to help cover Lica’s medical care and other expenses.

“He’s a very kind and dedicated doorman who’s the night watchman, so to speak,” Schoelkopf said. “He’s very kind, doesn’t speak English very well, but he’s always doing something, cleaning up. He’s very much there for the tenants.

“I felt terrible that he was just doing his job when this deranged person beat him up so badly that he had to go to the hospital.”

The battered doorman said he is thankful for the outpouring of support and care.

“It’s a difficult time right now,” he said. “But I live with hope. Everybody from the building has been supportive. I’ve been very, very grateful.”