Police say that this weekend, a 17-year-old transgender girl was stabbed almost 20 times at Miami International Airport. The report was turned in to court on Monday.
Police say the girl, whose name has not been made public, was struck “without provocation” just after 11:30 p.m. Saturday in the pre-security area on the fourth floor of MIA’s Concourse J. She was able to get away and was found on the third floor.
Alexander Paul Love, who is 29 years old, is now in jail at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center for the stabbing. Police say he came up behind the girl with a kitchen knife and cut her 18 times, mostly in the face, neck, and legs.
Love went to court on Monday morning and was charged with attempted murder. The judge told the police that Love could not post a bond.
Police have not yet said for sure if Love and the girl knew each other, but the Miami Herald was told by county officials that Love and the girl lived at the airport.
Ralph Cutie, who is in charge of MIA and is the head and CEO of the Miami-Dade Aviation Department, said that no one knows how long Love was at the airport.
Cutie said that cops do sweeps every night and try to help homeless people at the airport shelter. They might get a written notice for trespassing if they come back.
The Herald was told that Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava’s office was “going to review all of our protocols.”
She said, “We don’t want our airport to be a shelter, and we will keep working hard to find other options.” “Our services to help homeless people in Miami-Dade County are very good.”
The story says that the girl was eating a meal while sitting on the floor of the airport right before the attack. Love looked at the girl with his eyes wide open before pulling the knife out of his backpack.
The report says that the police found the butcher knife at the spot. Love was arrested by Customs and Border Protection agents not long after the fight.
Love was arrested in Ohio in 2016 on a misdemeanor domestic abuse charge, according to public records. Soon after, that case was thrown out. According to the story, Love is now homeless in South Florida. According to court records, he was arrested in Miami-Dade County in 2023 for minor crimes.
Love told police that he might have been high when he talked to them.
During the initial chaos, police were called to the scene of what was thought to be an active shooter, which caused a huge stir at the airport. That story, however, turned out to be false.
