Garner police investigate second bus stop stabbing in a month

Garner police are investigating a second stabbing at a bus stop in less than a month after one person was attacked just before 11:30 p.m. Tuesday near Garner Road and Avery Street. Officers said the victim reported that two men approached them and tried to rob them before the stabbing, and the case immediately sharpened concerns for riders waiting at night in southern Wake County.

The victim was taken to the hospital with injuries believed to be non-life-threatening, according to CBS 17. Police said the two suspects fled before officers arrived and had not been identified as of Wednesday morning. WRAL-linked reporting said Garner’s K-9 unit was requested to search the area near the Garner Performing Arts Center after the call came into Wake County 911, underscoring how quickly the search widened around one of the town’s most recognizable public spaces.

The new case lands only a month after a woman was stabbed at another Garner bus stop near the Walmart on Fayetteville Road. That attack was reported around 9:30 p.m. on May 9, and WRAL reported that the woman was expected to survive. Together, the two incidents have turned bus stops into a visible public safety concern, not just an isolated crime scene, because both happened after dark at places where riders expect to wait, not look over their shoulders.

For Garner, the timing is especially sensitive because the town and county have already spent years studying how transit should grow. The Town of Garner completed a local transit study in 2020, and the Garner Town Council adopted it on Feb. 16, 2021. Wake County’s original transit plan was adopted in 2016 and updated in 2021, and those plans include the Wake BRT Southern Corridor, which is intended to connect downtown Raleigh to Rupert Road in Garner.

That makes the violence more than a one-off police matter. If bus stops in Garner are perceived as repeat crime locations, the problem reaches into transit confidence, late-night service use and the basic question of whether riders can safely rely on the system after dark. With two suspects still at large and no connection yet established between the June 10 attack and the earlier stabbing near Walmart on Fayetteville Road, Garner police now face pressure to show what, if anything, has changed since the first assault.