Disturbing footage shows accused cop-shooting NYC migrant drag woman from car in violent mugging: NYPD

A Queens woman who police believe was robbed by the migrant accused of shooting two NYPD cops described how she was dragged from her car by a moped-riding crew during the violent snatch-and-grab mugging just blocks from her house.

Desiree Mason, 38, opened up about the harrowing attack in an exclusive interview with The Post in which she also thanked the wounded officers for getting alleged cop-shooter Bernardo Castro Mata off the streets.

Mason was dragged out of her own car parked in front of her Woodhaven home by a brute whom she identified as Mata — who allegedly grabbed her wallet and took off on a moped on the night of May 7.

Mata is being eyed as a person of interest in the harrowing incident, sources said.

“He pulled me right out of my car right in front of my own house!” she exclaimed.

The native New Yorker said she’s now anxious around anyone riding a moped in the neighborhood.

“I’ve lived here 38 years, I’ve never felt this way before,” she said. “Now I have something that’s a little like PTSD where I’m nervous around anyone on a moped, you know, thinking to myself, ‘Is he going to jump off and rob me?’”

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Mason expressed gratitude to the officers who were allegedly shot by the 19-year-old Venezuelan migrant early Monday after they chased him down for driving the wrong way down a street on a moped with no plates.

“I want to meet the three cops who caught him just to thank them,” she said Wednesday. “I want to say thank you for being a hero and putting your life on the line and I’m glad they’re okay.

“It makes me want to cry. They could have lost their lives. But I’m so happy that [Mata’s] off the streets because it could have gotten worse. [He] could have killed somebody! Damn!”

Mason was coming home from the beauty school she attends in Astoria and parked in front of her home just before 10:30 p.m. the night she was attacked.

Home security footage of the robbery obtained by The Post shows the attacker walk over to Mason’s car and pull her out of the driver’s seat while he tries to tear her purse out of her hands.

The pair tussle over the bag as Mason shouts out to her father inside their house.

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The brute believed to be Mata hits Mason as he tries to get her to release hold of her bag, the clip shows.

They continue to play tug-of-war with the purse until the mugger pulls Mason toward the street. She is knocked into a trash can and falls onto the roadway, rolling and being dragged as her attacker pulls at her purse, according to the video.

The robber is eventually able to snatch the purse when Mason drops its handles, and takes off running toward his accomplice who is waiting on the moped, according to the footage and Mason.

She yells at him that she caught him on camera, to which he replies, “I don’t care” as he runs off.

Mason said that by the time her family members and neighbors who heard her cries for help came out, her attacker was already running off with her bag, which held her wallet and several debit and credit cards.

“I thought it was safe here. I never felt this way here before,” she told The Post. “This got my mother and father all upset and worried. My dad’s coming down every night to watch me get out of my car now.”

Mason said she saw her attacker’s face up close and was going down to the police station to pick him out of a lineup.

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Mata, who entered the US illegally last year, is a person of interest in a string of moped-involved robberies in Queens, including Mason’s — though he has still not been charged in any of the incidents.

The moped-riding suspects often work in pairs and rip phones and purses out of New Yorkers’ hands as they zoom by on the motorized scooters.

“What we’ve seen in the past with these motorized scooters, they operate as a crew,’’ NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said at an earlier press briefing. “We’re looking at [Mata] for several other robbery patterns in the Queens area, where he does have other co-defendants.”

Such scooter-assisted crimes have soared over the past two years, with more than 80 reported to date this year alone.

The use of mopeds in phone snatchings has been linked to the brutal Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua , and Mata has since been suspected of being a member of the infamous group, according to law enforcement sources.

Mata — who had his asylum case dismissed as part of a Biden administration “mass amnesty’’ program — is believed to have joined the powerful criminal organization after he arrived in the US and possibly during his stay at a Queens hotel-turned-migrant shelter, the sources said.

The alleged cop-shooter has a tattoo on his arm of a clock intertwined with an anchor, which is reportedly a common ink among Tren de Aragua gang members.

Mata is facing two counts of attempted murder and a slew of other charges for the cop shooting.

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