Soros-Backed Manhattan DA Defends Woman Who Stabbed Bodega Worker

The gal pal of the ex-con killed while attacking Manhattan bodega worker Jose Alba was not charged with stabbing the clerk during the melee because prosecutors felt she was just defending her beau, police sources told The Post on Monday.

The decision stunned Alba’s supporters, not to mention the worker himself — who faces a controversial slay rap for the boyfriend’s death even though he and hordes of supporters say video shows he clearly was acting in self-defense, a bodega rep said.

“I don’t understand why the [district attorney] hasn’t charged her,” Francisco Marte of the Bodega and Small Business Association Group said outside Alba’s Hamilton Heights apartment after visiting the worker Monday.

He said the 61-year-old clerk and his supporters believe the 32-year-old gal pal should be locked up for stabbing Alba three times while he was fending off her irate boyfriend.

“She participated in that,” Marte said of the incident. “She’s supposed to be in jail and the $250,000 bail [Alba once faced] should be on her, not on him. He was just defending himself.”

But police sources said prosecutors refused to charge the woman because they felt she was justified because she was helping her boyfriend as he was being slashed.

“The DA’s office looked at the tape, and they felt she was defending her boyfriend,” a cop with knowledge of the situation told The Post. “They didn’t feel charges were necessary.”

But defense lawyer and former Bronx prosecutor Michael Discioarro said he’s in the Alba camp on this one.

“I have no idea why she’s not charged,” Discioarro said. “Her boyfriend was the aggressor. She does not get to protect the aggressor.

“We’re getting a good look at how the system works for the average person,” he said. “Imagine if there was no video. Jose Alba would never be released from Rikers, and [the girlfriend] would testify against him, likely perjuring herself.”

Alba was working behind the counter at the bodega July 1 when the woman became furious after her debit card was repeatedly denied as she sought to buy her 10-year-old daughter a bag of chips.

The woman claimed Alba was rude during the failed purchase and ran home to get her 35-year-old boyfriend, Austin Simon.

Simon, a career criminal who did state prison time for assaulting a cop, stormed behind the counter and shoved Alba into the wall — then blocked his exit, video shows.

Cornered, Alba reached for a knife and stabbed Simon five times and mortally wounded him — while also apparently being stabbed himself by the woman, wild security video shows.

Cops charged Alba with second-degree murder and weapons possession, and he was held on $250,000 bail until Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s office negotiated a $5,000 bond that allowed him to post bail and go home under heavy monitoring.

The woman later claimed to cops that she never stabbed Alba, despite the surveillance footage suggesting otherwise, sources said. She could not be reached for comment.

Manhattan prosecutors declined to comment Monday, saying the office does not discuss details of pending criminal cases.

Earlier Monday, Alba spoke out for the first time since the deadly incident.

“I’m very sad. I didn’t think this would happen,” he said in Spanish. “At the moment I was in shock. I didn’t know what to do and what to say.”

Asked if he had a message for Simon’s family, he said he was sorry.

“I’d tell them that I didn’t want to do this,” he said. “I ask that they please forgive me because I didn’t want to do that.”

Additional reporting by Elizabeth Rosner

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases