Published: 19:43 BST, 1 September 2026 | Updated: 21:38 BST, 1 September 2026
The female attacker who stabbed two people in Times Square was going through a difficult divorce and had been estranged from her daughters for years, according to her shell-shocked relatives.
Pamela Cisneros Lopez, 49, killed Bank of America executive Erin Piacenti, 32, and injured a 68-year-old man during a crazed rampage through the heart of New York City at about 4.30pm on Monday.
Disturbing video footage shows Lopez wearing a pink T-shirt with a cross-body bag, while brandishing two kitchen knives as police attempted to tase her before shooting her dead.
Her brother, Patrick Peralta, 58, told the Daily Mail on Tuesday that she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder about ten years ago, following a bout of postpartum depression after the birth of her second child around a decade before that.
Peralta spoke at their mother's home in Jackson Heights, Queens, where they grew up and where their relatives have gathered after hearing the news.
The 58-year-old said that they were a tight-knit family, and that Lopez was the youngest of six. She worked as an HR employee and was a daily churchgoer.
A woman could be heard wailing inside the family home as Peralta detailed the struggles his sister had faced over the past few years.
He said Lopez has three daughters aged in their late teens to late twenties. However, the youngest and eldest have been living in Florida with their father and have been estranged from Lopez for years due to her previous mental health issues.
Pamela Cisneros Lopez, 49, was killed on Monday after fatally stabbing Erin Piacenti and injuring an unidentified man. Her shell-shocked brother spoke with the Daily Mail on Tuesday
Erin Piacenti was the vice president of business selection and conflicts at the Bank of America
Lopez, 49, was gunned down after running at officers with the two kitchen knives, as caught in disturbing surveillance footage from Times Square
Lopez's middle child is non-verbal with severe autism, and lives at a care home in Brooklyn. Peralta said that Lopez had struggled with postpartum depression since her birth, and had tried to bring the children up for years until she could no longer cope.
'I think she felt like she hadn't accomplished anything with her life because she was at home with the kids,' Peralta told the Daily Mail.
Lopez had also been 'going through a divorce for the past five to eight years,' and Peralta said he wasn't sure whether it had been finalized.
