The student was kicked in the head and almost thrown on train tracks. Photos / Supplied
The student was kicked in the head and almost thrown on train tracks. Photos / Supplied
A brutal attack in which an Auckland school student was kicked in the head and almost thrown on train tracks has horrified his mother and raised concerns about public safety.
The 14-year-old One Tree Hill College student was allegedly knocked to the ground in an attack at Otahuhu station yesterday in front of security and witnesses.
His mother Ina Matua said two older boys - one reportedly in a Kelston Boys' High School uniform - continued kicking the teenager for up to three minutes without anyone, including the security guards, intervening.
The attack happened at Otahuhu Station Photo / Dean Purcell
The boys then attempted to drag him across the platform and hurl him on to the tracks, but were prevented by the younger student's desperate struggles.
As a member of One Tree Hill's first XV rugby side, he had stayed back for practice after school yesterday before meeting two female friends and heading home with them.
The trio walked to Ellerslie station, but once on the train, the two older boys sat nearby and began to "eye-off" the girls and "freak them out", according to Ina's son.
When they then got off at Otahuhu station at about 5.40pm, the boys followed.
Ina's son turned to them, but the boys closed in, saying "what are you looking at, let's do it, lets have a one-on-one".
He shaped up to them but was knocked down by the second punch before they both started "low-blowing him on the ground" for about two-to-three minutes.
As many as five kicks rained down on his ear, throat and into his ribs, while they also stomped on his foot.
The girls rushed to a nearby security staff member, calling on him to help. He headed to a control room where he apparently called the police, the girls told Ina.
Other security staff were nearby but also didn't rush to help, the girls said.
Another witness, who was a doctor from Starship Children's Hospital, later also told Ina that she had approached security staff for help but they wouldn't get close.
Ina Matua questioned why security staff didn't try to step in and help her son while he was being attacked at Otahuhu station. Photo / Supplied
Later at hospital, her bruised and bloodied son was found to have concussion but otherwise escaped serious injury.
Matua said police and Auckland Transport had given great support since the attack, but she questioned why security staff were posted on trains and at stations if they wouldn't intervene during attacks.
"It could have been worse – they could have killed my son," Ina said.
"A train could have come if they threw him on the track."
"It makes me ask why would you be in a security position when you didn't try to help someone who was asking for help - it still hurts to talk about it."
One Tree Hill principal Nick Coughlan said Ina's son was a fine student and the school was now doing its best to support the family.
But Ina now remained concerned about letting her son do after hours activities because it meant he couldn't catch the school bus and would instead have to take public transport.
She also urged her son's attackers to hand themselves in.
"They just need to come forward," she said.
The student's bloodied shirt. Photo / Supplied
"There is always two sides to a story, and even if my son maybe did something wrong that he is not saying, come forward because that could help you."
