NYC coward breaks nose of 63-year-old mom in random attack: I was praying to every god I know

A violent coward randomly slugged a mom in a broad-daylight Bronx attack, cops said Tuesday — as the victim’s son lamented he always warned her not to go out after noon because of the neighborhood.The disturbed creep approached 63-year-old Belkys Pena around 3 p.m.Friday as she walked along University Avenue near West 183rd Street in Morris Heights, authorities said.The unidentified man punched Pena in the face without saying a word, knocking her unconscious and breaking her nose.When the bleeding woman came to, she called her son, 37-year-old social worker Rey Pena.“When I got there, she was just crying and shaking hysterically,” Rey told The Post in a phone interview.

“I thought the worst when I was called.… I was praying to every god I know.

And when I got there, all I could do was cover her, protect her in my arms.”“[A] crossing guard actually saw the punch,” Rey said.“[The suspect] kept walking after he punched her, and then when he saw the crossing guard see him, he started running across the street.

“It’s just a coward.It’s just a coward,” Rey said of his mom’s attacker, who is still in the wind.He said his mother — who speaks limited English — has not ventured outside since the assault, with family visiting to make sure she’s OK.

“I’ve always told my mom to not leave the house after 12, being that we live in a very high-crime rate neighborhood in The Bronx,” Rey said, adding that his mother was walking to cash a check at the time.“So she went out at 3.

And these are the kind of things that you are statistically susceptible to if you’re unguarded.“I told her, ‘You go out and do what you have to do from 9 to 12,’ and, ‘You have a different environment of people around lunchtime,’ ” he said.“Everybody wants to go home, everybody’s hungry, these kind of things are more prevalent.”Overall felony crime in the 52nd Precinct, where the senseless attack happened, has slightly dipped so far this yea...