Yale student Ari Shtein, 18, appeared in New York Criminal Court on Wednesday over allegations that he sexually assaulted a mother travelling with her four children on a Manhattan subway train. He faces charges including sexual abuse, aggravated sexual abuse, forcible touching and endangering the welfare of a child; he has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyer says the allegation is false. The case concerns a serious alleged assault in a public setting and is continuing through the New York courts.

Prosecutors allege that Shtein inserted two fingers into the 30-year-old woman’s vagina on an uptown R train approaching West 28th Street on 28 June, while her children, aged seven to 11, were present. He was arrested on 8 July and released without bail after a judge declined the Manhattan District Attorney’s request for a $10,000 bond. The brief hearing did not involve Shtein addressing the court; he was seen reading Tom Stoppard’s play *Arcadia*, and his next court date is 29 October.