Train Impostor With Asperger’s Sentenced to Prison

A man arrested more than two dozen times for posing as a transit worker to steal buses and trains and drive the routes was sentenced Thursday to two and a half to five years for his latest caper.

Darius McCollum, 49, nodded politely and answered “yes” as the sentencing began. He pleaded guilty earlier this year to stealing a Trailways bus in 2010, when he was arrested behind the wheel on the highway that leads to Kennedy International Airport.

He had faced up to 15 years if convicted at a trial, but the Queens district attorney and his lawyer worked out a deal. McCollum will voluntarily enter a program in which he will undergo cognitive behavioral therapy when he gets out of jail.

McCollum was diagnosed with what was until recently called Asperger’s syndrome but is now referred to as an autism spectrum disorder, and his repeated arrests stem in part from the condition.

“Hopefully we don’t see you back here and this is the end of this stuff,” said Queens Supreme Court Justice Barry Kron.

McCollum has become a celebrity for escapades that began at age 15, when he piloted a subway train six stops without any passengers noticing. He grew up in Queens near the 179th Street station on the F and E lines, and learned the mechanics of the transit system from workers who took an interest in him.

He had the subway map memorized by the time he was eight and tried unsuccessfully to get a job with the transit system. Instead he became a transit impostor and has been arrested 29 times. But he is not a violent criminal; he just drives the routes, fixes tracks and takes tolls without an official job until he’s caught by police.

“I really do want to change,” he said. “I have motivation and people behind me.”

Part of the problem, his attorney said, is that McCollum wasn’t diagnosed with the disorder until recently. He was first handed literature on the topic about 10 years ago during a Manhattan case, but the judge refused to order a psychiatric evaluation after saying she looked the disorder up online and decided he didn’t have it.

A treatment program had never previously been proposed as a solution to his crimes.

“Both sides recognize that locking him up doesn’t make any sense,” said his defense lawyer, Sally Butler. She and the prosecutor are recommending McCollum be paroled as soon as possible, but it’s not clear when he will go before the parole board. He has already served the minimum.

“He’s a New York hero,” Butler said. “They love him. Everyone just wants him to get help.”

This article appeared in print on page 5 of the August 16th, 2013 edition of Hamodia.