Family of NYC U-Haul driver who ran over 8 details history of violence, mental illness
The crazed U-Haul driver who allegedly mowed down at least eight people, killing one, during a violent Brooklyn rampage Monday has a troubling history of violence and mental illness — and spent time in prison for knifing his brother, his family said.
The suspect — identified by police sources as Weng Sor, 62, — served about 17 months behind bars for stabbing his brother in Las Vegas, Nevada in 2015, according to court and prison records.
He was then sentenced to nearly a year in the county jail in 2020 for stabbing a man during a scuffle — and underwent months of psychiatric evaluation.
“He’s a schizophrenic. He’s crazy,” Daryl Singer, Sor’s brother-in-law told The Post.
“I always said he’s probably going to kill himself one day, that’s the way I saw it. He just doesn’t know how to lead a normal life.”
Singer said his troubled kin was known to “make threats” — and called on him to be locked up for life.
“I’m not surprised by any of this,” Singer said. “He belongs in an institution for the rest of his life… tied to the bed, away from everybody.
“Because he might freak out. He might just kill somebody.”
Sor — who is believed to be homeless — allegedly went off the rails in Bay Ridge on Monday morning, running down cyclists and pedestrians in the van he had been living out of, according to police sources.
2. Bay Ridge Pkwy., 5th Ave., male on an e-bike.
3. Bay Ridge Pkwy., 7th Ave, male on an e-bike.
4. Bay Ridge Pkwy., 12th Ave, male on an e-bike.
5. 72nd St and 3rd Ave., two pedestrians struck.
6. 54th St, 4th Ave, pedestrian.
7. Columbia St. and Hamilton Ave. Truck was finally stopped.
The frantic 30-minute rampage injured at least eight people — including an NYPD cop.
“Shoot me! I’m not stopping,” the unhinged driver shouted at cops who tried to pull him over after he’d left a trail of victims in his wake, the sources said.
After he was taken into custody, Sor told the officers he “wanted to die,” sources said.
His son, Stephen Sor, 30, told the Associated Press outside his Brooklyn home: “Very frequently he’ll choose to skip out on his medications and do something like this.”
“This isn’t the first time he’s been arrested. It’s not the first time he’s gone to jail,” the son said.
He said his father had been living in Las Vegas for the past few years and that the two have a “rocky” relationship — adding he was shocked when his dad showed up in Brooklyn in the middle of the night about a week ago.
Singer said Sor lived with his mother and other relatives in Las Vegas for several years before he packed up and moved to Florida without explanation several months ago.
Read more of The Post’s coverage on the Brooklyn U-Haul rampage
- One of the victims of the U-Haul rampage in Brooklyn has died from his injuries
- Family of NYC U-Haul driver who ran over 8 details history of violence, mental illness
- U-Haul ‘rampage’ as driver plows into New Yorkers, tells cops: ‘Shoot me. I’m not stopping’
“The mother does all she can for him because she’s all he’s got. She’s helped him out so much, renting a room for him and he screwed that up, getting kicked out of three different places that he’s lived,” Singer told The Post.
“He used to work, and then what happened one day was he decided to get a bus ticket and go to Florida,” Singer said. “And that was the last thing that I heard about him from anybody. None of the family members talk about anything he’s done.
“They’re scared of him,” he said of the family. “He’s just whacked in his head. I don’t know why. Everyone else in the family is normal. He’s the only one that’s not.”
Singer, who also lives in Vegas, said Sor’s bizarre behavior dates back years.
“We’ve gone out to dinner when he was living here and everything seemed normal at first,” he recalled. “He just doesn’t take his meds for his problem, and he starts talking weird stuff — church and God and Satan, and everybody’s gonna get killed pretty soon.
“His mother’s telling him, ‘Stop it,’ and he just rambles on.”
NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said at a press briefing that crime scene cops are now examining seven different locations where Sor allegedly injured the victims.
Police have not revealed a motive for the crazed four-wheel assaults.
“We know a very limited amount about the suspect at this time,” Sewell said. “That’s part of our investigation.”
With Post wires
