KEY POINTS:
A 14-year-old boy was last night arrested in connection with two daylight robbery attacks on women in Whangarei.
Police charged him with two counts of robbery and he is likely to be charged with aggravated wounding. He will appear in the Youth Court this morning.
The charges are understood to relate to two attacks in the past few days. One was on an elderly woman walking with a cane, the other on a grandmother out with her 10-week-old grandson.
Both attacks happened in Islington St - a quiet, residential street off Kensington Ave - and targeted vulnerable women in broad daylight.
The first was on Saturday about 4pm and left the 61-year-old grandmother unconscious. The second happened about 4.30pm on Monday.
The two women, one nursing a black eye and bruises to her jaw, the other lucky to escape with grazes to her hands and knees, are vowing not to let the attacks stop them walking in Kensington, the neighbourhood they have called home for decades.
In the latest attack, an 80-year-old woman with two hip replacements was walking along Islington St 100m from her home when she was knocked into the gutter and her handbag stolen.
The woman, who did not want to be named for fear she could be targeted again, said she was returning from a friend's house in Oranga St when a man appeared from a driveway and lunged at her.
"He grabbed my bag and he knocked me in the gutter," she said. "He was a big strong bloke. I never heard him coming. He must have been waiting for me.
"I picked myself up out of the gutter and I saw him running for all he was worth. I yelled out, 'Stop!' - as though he would."
She returned home with the help of a woman living nearby and rang police. Her purse contained about $30 and a credit card.
"I've got two plastic hips and I'm always careful about falling over. I was very lucky just to get a few cuts."
Her usual transport is a mobility scooter, but on Monday she was out walking with a cane.
After living in the area for 10 years, she had no intention of changing her walking routine: "I never had trouble before and I'll keep walking."
In Saturday's robbery another Kensington woman was knocked unconscious as she pushed her grandson in a stroller. She was struck from behind and never saw her assailant.
"I heard someone running behind me and didn't take much notice," she said.
"The next thing I woke up on the ground. I don't even know what they hit me with or how long I was out.
"I came to and thought, 'What the hell has happened?' I immediately saw my handbag was gone and then I checked my grandson, who thankfully slept through the whole thing."
A passing man and his daughter stopped and helped her home.
Her bag was later found in nearby bushes but a wallet with about $60 cash and credit cards was missing.
The bashing has left the woman "bloody angry".
"It annoys me that these toe-rags think they can do this in broad daylight."
-NORTHERN ADVOCATE
