Four teenagers have admitted taking part in an "appalling" mob attack on three women at a retail park that left one of the victims with a broken jaw.
A 14-year-old boy, who can’t be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty at Cheshire Youth Court in Warrington on Wednesday, April 5, to Section 20 assault grievous bodily harm (GBH) over the assault on a 20-year-old woman at the entry to Trident Park in Runcorn at 9.50pm on Saturday, May 14, last year. The youth was acquitted of the more serious charge of Section 18 GBH with intent, with no evidence offered.
Court papers said the youth was remanded on bail with a 7pm to 7am electronically-monitored curfew to await sentence on May 25. He was also banned from contacting the three victims in the case and barred from entering Runcorn McDonald’s, Asda, Trident Park and Shopping City.
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A 14-year-old girl also charged over the attack was acquitted of Section 18 and Section 20 GBH with no evidence offered, but pleaded guilty to two counts of assault by beating in relation to the main victim and one of her friends at the scene.
She received a youth rehabilitation order and was told to pay £50 in compensation to each of her victims.
Court papers said the order replaced a similar punishment imposed in January for separate offences of assault by beating and damaging someone’s mobile phone from an incident committed on October 31.
Back in September, two other youths were convicted in connection with the Trident Park assault.
A boy, now 15, admitted assault by beating against one of the women, and received a nine-month referral order and told to pay £100 compensation, and a girl, now 13, admitted two counts of assault by beating against the main victim and another woman, receiving a youth referral order with an order for £100 of compensation marked against each charge.
At the time of the “unprovoked attack”, Cheshire Police said the three women had been assaulted by a group of about 10 youths, who punched and kicked the women and then fled, some on bikes.
The attack caused widespread shock and outrage over youth crime being out of control, leading to Mike Amesbury, Labour MP for Weaver Vale, which covers most of east Runcorn, raising the issue in Parliament in May last year, putting a question to the then-Home Secretary Priti Patel who branded the assault “appalling”.
Mr Amesbury told the Commons the victim was “beaten senseless” and her jaw had been broken in several places.
He said: “The Home Secretary spoke about mob rule.
“A bunch - a minority - of young people believe that they are given free rein. There is a lack of neighbourhood and community policing.
“Cuts have consequences. Twenty-two thousand police were cut over 12 years and that has serious consequences for people’s lives.
“What is the Home Secretary going to do about that?
“That is a real noise in communities.”
Ms Patel called it an “appalling case of serious violence” that “we should not tolerate at all”, and accused Labour of voting against Tory efforts to cut crime.
She said: “But with all respect to him, he represents a party that has voted against the Government’s work on police, crime, sentencing and courts as well as the resources that we put into policing.”
Trident Park has suffered recurrent outbreaks of youth crime and antisocial behaviour in recent years, leading to a string of disperal orders, arrests, charges, prosecutions and convictions from Cheshire Police.
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