BROOKLYN, NY - A woman was stabbed in the neck and left critically injured while jogging along a local path around 8:00 p.m. on Friday.
The victim, 28-year-old Katie Suarez was running on the Shore Parkway Greenway, a paved waterfront trail, when she "sustained multiple stab wounds to the neck," according to a press release from the New York Police Department (NYPD) reviewed by PEOPLE. EMTs transported Suarez to NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn in critical condition, where she has since been declared brain dead.
Police sources said Suarez was training for the New York City Marathon at the time of the attack. Sources familiar with the family said that Suarez had left work earlier that evening and had been planning to meet up with her parents after the run.
The sources said Suarez's parents spoke to her on the phone at around 8:00 p.m. and she told them she was about half a mile away. The sources said the woman's parents became concerned when she failed to show up at their pre-planned meeting point and did not subsequently answer her phone.
Authorities said Suarez's cellphone and jewelry were still with her, leading investigators to believe the attack was not a robbery, ABC7 reported. The assault is believed to have been random and unprovoked. Police have also said they have been unable to recover surveillance video from the remote area where the attack occurred.
"We believe it to be some sort of random attack at this time," NYPD Chief of Detectives Joe Kenny told ABC News. "She was a very private person. For someone to know that she was going to be there at that exact time would be extraordinary for us to find out."
Authorities are looking for the person responsible for the attack and are asking anyone who may have seen Suarez between 7:56 p.m. and 8:12 p.m. "in the vicinity of the eastbound bike path along the Belt Parkway, between Bay 8 Street and Bay 17 Street" or anyone with any information to come forward.
Anyone with information can call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-8477.
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