City Hall hammer attacker: I did it because they called me ‘gay’

Suspect confessed to wielding the tool after an alleged slur.

Douglas Epp -- originally arraigned under the name John Yoos -- now claims he attacked a Spanish tourist in City Hall Park last month after being called "gay" and "a Nazi."

A Canadian man accused of assaulting a Spanish tourist with a hammer outside City Hall this summer confessed to the crime, but said he did it because the man and his girlfriend called him "gay” and “a Nazi."

"They called me ‘gay’ and a ‘Nazi,’" the attacker told cops, according to documents released Tuesday in Manhattan Supreme Court. “Something inside me snapped and I grabbed the hammer and attacked the male. This is not my demeanor. I am ashamed that this altercation occurred. This was clearly not the correct reaction.”

Cops had immediately arrested their suspect in the July 30 attack, and the hammer-swinger gave his name as John Yoos. But prosecutors revealed Tuesday that his real name is Douglas Epp, a 39-year-old Canadian citizen now living in Crown Heights.

Epp went to school with Yoos, an American chess master who has lived in Canada since 1999, prosecutor John Temple said.

Temple added that investigators have seen the real Yoos' passport and other documents and are confident that Yoos had nothing to do with the City Hall Park attack.

According to court records, Epp donned a conservative dark suit and headed to downtown Manhattan, looking for a job at a restaurant. He stopped in the park to read a newspaper when Hugo Alejandre, 31, of Barcelona, arrived with his girlfriend.

The couple ate pizza on a nearby bench, but then, Epp said, "They had some rude words to say and the 'Nazi' term came up on several occasions."

That’s when he grabbed a hammer from under a park bench hit Alejandre over his left eye with the claw end, cops said.

In court Tuesday, Epp, slim in a dark suit with a shaved head and black canvas shoes, looked relaxed and almost bemused by the formal proceedings. He is being held without bail.

Alejandre, who suffered a fractured skull and defensive wounds on his hand and arms, has returned to Barcelona.