A routine Monday afternoon in one of Manhattan’s busiest districts turned deadly when a knife-wielding woman attacked two strangers within seconds, killing 32-year-old Bank of America vice president Erin Piacenti. The stabbing happened near Seventh Avenue and West 42nd Street, only blocks from the financial executive’s Midtown workplace, according to the NYPD and Reuters.
Piacenti, a Chester, New Jersey resident and trained attorney, was vice president of Business Selection and Conflicts at Bank of America. Reuters reported that the bank confirmed her death Tuesday after police identified her as the woman fatally wounded in the Times Square attack.
“We are shocked and deeply saddened by the tragic loss of our colleague. She was a valued teammate who will be greatly missed. Our hearts go out to her family and all of her loved ones,” Bank of America said in an emailed statement to Reuters.
Piacenti had been with Bank of America since February 2025, according to publicly available professional information reflecting her LinkedIn career history. That means she had held the vice president role for roughly a year and a half before her death. Her position placed her at the intersection of law, compliance, and major financial transactions, an area she had been building toward for years.
Before joining Bank of America, Piacenti spent more than three years at prestigious New York law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell, beginning there as an associate in October 2021. During that period, she also completed a roughly six-month secondment in Morgan Stanley’s Legal and Compliance Division from August 2023 to February 2024. She remained with Davis Polk until January 2025 before moving to Bank of America the following month.
Her résumé started well before Wall Street. Piacenti graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2016 and earned her law degree from Fordham University School of Law in 2021. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that she attended Villa Walsh Academy, a private girls’ school in Morristown, New Jersey, and had longstanding ties to music. She performed with the New Jersey Youth Chorus and later joined Penn’s Dischord A Cappella group, where she sang solos and helped arrange music.
Those details add another layer to a story that initially broke as a frightening burst of violence in Times Square. Police said Pamela Cisneros, 49, first approached a 68-year-old man near West 41st Street and Seventh Avenue. The man had exited the subway and was waiting to cross the street with his wife when Cisneros allegedly pulled out two knives and stabbed him in the abdomen.
Seconds later, investigators say Cisneros continued north and attacked Piacenti, stabbing her in the abdomen near West 42nd Street. The two attacks happened roughly 20 seconds apart, according to police accounts. Both victims were transported to Bellevue Hospital. Piacenti was pronounced dead, while the male victim survived and was reported in stable condition.
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch described the attacks as “random and unprovoked” and said investigators had no reason to believe the incident was connected to terrorism. Police said witnesses alerted nearby officers, who confronted Cisneros while she was still holding two knives.
According to Tisch, officers spent about four minutes repeatedly ordering Cisneros to drop the weapons. Police then deployed Tasers, but authorities said they failed to stop her. When Cisneros advanced toward the officers, two officers fired their service weapons. She was transported to Bellevue, where she was pronounced dead. Police recovered both knives from the scene.
Authorities said Cisneros had documented prior mental health-related contacts with the NYPD dating to 2018 and 2019 but no arrest history with the department. The circumstances surrounding both the stabbing spree and the officers’ use of deadly force remain under review.
“The investigation remains ongoing by the NYPD Force Investigation Division,” the NYPD said in a statement.
The location made the killing especially jarring. Bank of America’s One Bryant Park office sits near Times Square, placing Piacenti’s workplace within walking distance of where she was attacked. The stabbing unfolded during the afternoon in an area routinely packed with commuters, tourists and workers.
Piacenti had also recently reached major milestones away from work. She and her husband, who also attended Fordham Law, married in 2024 and had celebrated their second wedding anniversary in August. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that the couple married in Manahawkin, New Jersey, while People reported they had recently purchased their first home in Chester.
At 32, Piacenti had already moved from Penn to Fordham Law, into one of the country’s best-known law firms, through a stint inside Morgan Stanley and eventually into a vice president position at Bank of America. What police describe as a chance encounter in Times Square ended that trajectory in seconds.
Now, as investigators examine the police response and the events that preceded the attack, Bank of America employees, friends and relatives are mourning a colleague whose life extended far beyond the corporate title attached to the first breaking-news alerts.
