A witness, Sarah said she was driving past with her husband when she noticed the attack. By the time they had turned the offenders had already left.
“I asked the girls if they knew [the offenders], they said ‘no’ and were very shaken so we sent them home,” said Sarah.
“It happened very quickly. If nobody had stopped to get involved it could have been worse.”
Both their phones were stolen, and the pair asked a couple walking their baby if they could use their phone to call home. The girls were shortly back home safe, but the trauma remained.
“We called 105 and let the police know an assault had taken place, [my daughter] didn’t want to go back to school and was pretty scared,” the mother said.
“Everybody is disgusted and furious, they just want to find the people who did this.”
According to Downes and Sarah, the two teenage attackers had both been dropped off and picked back up by a teenage boy in a car - who was parked across the road from the bus stop, during the attack, waiting to coordinate an escape.
When the family reached out to the community, Downes received at least five videos of the teenage driver involved in different attacks on school-aged children.
It’s understood the boy is aged just 14.
The attack came after her daughter had only just returned from a regional taekwondo championship in Blenheim over the weekend, she’d won gold for the third year running.
“She can protect herself, she has a phone to contact us when she needs to but in this case, the things we’d put in place for her have not been helpful.”
A police spokesperson said they received a report of an assault on Kirk Rd and learned of two victims with minor injuries - “positive lines of inquiry” are being made to identify the offenders involved.
Despite no arrests at this stage, Downes said she has already submitted photos to police of the culprit they believe was involved. CCTV footage was also captured of the assault by the camera of a nearby chemist.
Young people in Christchurch have become common victims of assault in recent months, in particular incidents at Westfield’s Riccarton Mall where school students were being targeted.
In early September, footage emerged of a group of teenagers beating up a 14-year-old boy outside the mall entrance to Pak’nSave. One of the youths ended up apologising to the victim, it was revealed the group consisted of children aged as young as 11.
It turned out Lisa Downes had chatted with her daughter only a few days before the attack about safety in light of the incidents.
“I’m definitely aware, I’ve read news reports and we often talk as a family about what they would do if they were assaulted,” she said.
“You never think it’ll happen to you but there are definitely open conversations about what’s going on.”
