A 54-year-old woman who recently had a liver transplant says that she was assaulted and thrown to the ground for asking a fellow shopper to wear her mask correctly.

Margot Kagan is now in the hospital recovering from broken bones.

“I had a liver transplant four months ago, so this is a whole different world of pain,” Kagan said from her hospital bed at Hackensack Medical Center.

Kagan says that she was shopping at the Staples in Hackensack on Wednesday when the assault happened. She was at the copy machine next to a woman who was at the second machine.

“The woman on one side of the plastic dividers had a mask, but here, below her mouth…I said, ‘You should really put a mask on,’…she proceeded to curse, curse me out,” Kagan said.

Kagan uses a cane to walk, as she is still frail following her transplant. She says that she made one more comment to the woman.

“And I said to her, ‘You’re endangering everyone,’ and I went back to faxing,” Kagan said.

Kagan says that the woman then walked around the divider, grabbed her cane and knocked her to the ground, breaking her left tibia. The woman then ran off.

Hackensack police have surveillance video of the incident and are now trying to locate the woman.

Kagan will undergo surgery to have a steel plate put in her knee.