Bat-wielding jerk bashes NYC straphanger for refusing to hand over $20: cops

A bat-wielding goon bashed a commuter in the head after he refused to cough up $20 on a Queens subway platform, according to authorities and the victim’s grandmother.

Connecticut resident Matthew Trudeau, 21, was visiting the Big Apple for a concert and waiting for an N train at Queensboro Plaza around 11:45 p.m. when the pushy perp approached him and asked for $20, cops and sources said.

Trudeau replied “No,” prompting the menace to pull out a baseball bat that was attached to his backpack and slam the victim in the back of the head, according to cops and sources.

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“I don’t know exactly what happened,” his grandmother, Ann Vaillancourt, told The Post by phone. “I know he went to a concert, and then we get the call that he’s in the hospital. I guess he got hit in the head with a steel bat.

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“He’s very quiet kid. He don’t bother anybody,” Vaillancourt said of her grandson. “I don’t think he would have said anything to get somebody to go after him like that. I guess [the suspect] wanted his money.”

Vaillancourt said she was “hurt” when she heard what happened to Matthew.

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“We were all scared, the whole family, all the aunts and uncles and cousins, and we were all upset over it,” she said. “So, yeah, it’s quite scary. Thank God it wasn’t a gun, or he hit him harder and pushed his skull in or something.”

The attacker – believed to be around 18 years old, 5-foot-10, wearing an orange hoodie and carrying a gray backpack – then fled on a southbound N train, sources said.

Photos show the victim being escorted into an ambulance with a bandage on his head. He was taken to Weill Cornell Medical Center, where he was listed in stable condition.

No arrests had been made in the attack by Monday morning, cops said.

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