Ammon News - The man accused of stabbing author Salman Rushdie on a stage in western New York on Friday is a 24-year-old man from Fairview, New Jersey, according to authorities.

Police identified the suspect as Hadi Matar, 24, in a news release distributed hours after the Indian-born author’s attack.

Rushdie, 75, was about to speak at a literary festival hosted by the Chautauqua Institution late in the morning when Matar allegedly rushed on stage and stabbed him at least once in the neck and the stomach, Maj Eugene Staniszewski of New York state police said.

Spectators and institution staffers rushed Matar and tackled him after the stabbing, Staniszewski added. A state trooper and a local sheriff’s office deputy working security at the talk then moved in and arrested him.