Police: Nurse punched paralyzed Coram vet ‘several times’

A licensed practical nurse was arrested Friday morning after punching a paralyzed Korean War veteran “several times” near his eye because he told her employer she was tardy, police said.

The 83-year-old victim, a paraplegic since a 1975 motor vehicle crash, was confined to a stretcher when the assault at his Coram home fractured an orbital bone; he was treated at Stony Brook University Hospital, Suffolk police said in a statement.

Areatha Pickens, 44, of Flores Lane, Coram, was charged with assault; she is scheduled to be arraigned Friday at First District Court in Central Islip.