Repeat subway crime offender busted. Again. Tally at 142, cops report

Serial subway crime offender Charles Barry was busted Wednesday for allegedly scamming two Brazilian tourists out of $25 -- and was promptly nailed for another earlier case, bringing his notorious arrest total to 142, police said.

In the latest case, Barry, 56, was arrested at 12:30 p.m. inside the subway station at W. 42nd St. and 7th Ave. after cops saw him take $25 from two Brazilian tourists, then hand the pair a Metro Card that had no value on it. Police said the empty Metro Card trick is a familiar one for Barry, who in the past has pretended to be a transit worker who tells unsuspecting victims that the Metro Card machine is broken.

Barry was also wanted for scamming the same amount last Saturday from a wheelchair-bound Dallas woman visiting the city with her cop husband, police said.

In that case, his 142nd arrest, he allegedly scammed the couple during their visit to the city. According to authorities, the disabled woman’s officer husband was shot and wounded in the 2016 ambush in which five cops were killed and eight others wounded.

“I want to sell my story to the Daily News. It’s a false arrest," Barry told a News reporter Wednesday. "They are targeting me because of the bail reform.”

“They release me again and again. ... They are targeting me. I am going to sell my story to you.”

Barry, talking with officers on each side of him, declared: “It’s about bail reform. I am the poster boy. I’ll sell my story to you when I get out.”

“I’ll be out tomorrow. Because of the bail reform law, that’s why.”

The NYPD says Barry’s case highlights what is wrong with bail reform, with judges not able to keep behind bars the career criminals who commit the same crimes over and over.

The Legal Aid Society, which represents Barry, and other advocates argue police are fear mongering, highlighting a few recidivists while ignoring the benefits of bail and other reforms that took effect Jan. 1. Those reforms, advocates say, give people accused of crimes the ability to stay in school or return to work while their cases are pending.

“Mr. Barry’s case underscores the need for economic stability and meaningful social services, not a need to rollback bail reform,” said Legal Aid spokesman Redmond Haskins. “Locking up Mr. Barry on unaffordable bail or worse, remanding without bail, ultimately does nothing to protect the public and fails entirely to address his actual needs.”

Hsakins added, "Despite what the NYPD and others contend, pre-trial incarceration actually erodes public safety and perpetuates recidivism. It’s shameful that law enforcement continues to leak deceptive information about our most vulnerable clients to serve their pro-carceral, racially biased and regressive agenda.”

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