By Brendan Rees
A brave woman has told of the moment she tried to break up a brawl at Fountain Gate Shopping Centre where a teen was left bloodied in what’s believed to be a scissor attack.
Amanda, who asked her surname not to be published, was shopping at Myer about 4pm on Saturday, 1 February, when a row broke out between a group of teenage boys.
Amanda said she tried to intervene by putting her hand out in front of one of the boys, telling him to “just stop it, just stop it” while another shopper shouted at the boys to get out.
According to Amanda, the boy she tried to hold back “kept antagonising” the group and “going back” to help his brother.
“What they were after them for I don’t know,” she said.
At this stage, the fight between the group aged between 15 and 18 years of age, had escalated and spilled outside near the Shingle Inn cafe and Amanda called police.
“The next minute I saw them picking the sign up from Myer, and running at the boy with the sign, and then things were getting smashed,” Amanda said.
“One of the Myer staff said: ‘One of the boys’ been stabbed in the neck with scissors’.
“Someone else shouted: ‘He’s been stabbed’,” Amanda said, as dozens of onlookers videoed the fallout of the incident before police arrived and taped off the area.
Amanda said one of the boys injured in the fight was given first aid by Myer staff members.
“They’re trying to mop him up and there’s blood all over the floor,” she said.
Victoria Police spokesman Sergeant Cameron Scott said two boys had been charged “following an assault at a Narre Warren shopping centre”.
He said a 15-year-old from Dandenong was charged with affray and intentionally cause injury and was remanded in custody to appear at a children’s court at a later date.
The second boy, a 14-year-old from Frankston, was charged with affray and bailed to appear at a children’s court later this month.
Police could not confirm whether a pair of scissors had been used in the assault, saying the “injuries are non-life threatening”.
Paramedics treated a teenage boy at the scene and taken to Dandenong Hospital in a stable condition with an upper body injury.
Sunil, a staff member at Shingle Inn, said he was in the kitchen when he heard screaming and fighting.
He said panic-stricken customers stayed in the cafe between half-an-hour and 45 minutes.
“It is very dangerous these young people fighting,” he said. “I’ve got the metal signs outside – they may use sometime. I have seen on the news what happens”.
Gembrook MP Brad Battin said violence at the shopping centre was “only increasing” and called on the State Government to take action.
“The safety of staff and shoppers should not be placed under risk,” he said.
“Daniel Andrews must act immediately in providing the adequate resources to assist police in in restoring a safe shopping and work environment for Casey residents.”
Westfield’s Scentre group said the incident was reported to police and could not comment any further.
