Seven injured in Timaru gang ‘bloodbath’

Press, 28 July 1986, Page 7

Seven injured in Timaru gang ‘bloodbath’

PA Timaru Seven people were injured in a gang-related attack on their flat in Timaru early yesterday.

Men armed with bats forced their way into the upstairs flat in Stafford Street about 3.30 a.m. and created what an onlooker described as a bloodbath.

One youth, battered by softball bats as he lay in bed sleeping, was last evening seriously ill in Timaru Hospital with head and chest injuries. Four other youths were also taken to hospital. Two were treated and discharged. The other two were admitted with head, arm, and body injuries.

They were said last evening to be comfortable. Within hours of the attack police arrested seven men, who will appear in the District Court at Timaru today charged with unlawful assembly. Police have yet to establish the motive for the attack, but they are playing down gang-related asp< ~lose attacked have a (Delation with the T Henchmen gang, and arrests were made at the headquarters of the Road Knights.

An onlooker told the "Timaru Herald” newspaper that the attack came after a party at the

flat The, incident began when two cars in Stafford Street owned by occupants of the flat were attacked. Windows were smashed and tyres slashed.

The attackers then broke down the locked ground-floor door to gain access to the flat

“We were trapped,” the onlooker said. “The only way in is up the stairs and there was no phone.”

She said the attackers wore crash helmets and carried softball bats.

“They belted two of the girls but the chap who was asleep in bed... they bashed him so much. There was blood every-

where,” she said. “Another one was kicked while on the ground and his eye is badly damaged. “It was just a bloody bloodbath. Everyone was as scared as hell.”

She thought the attackers had staked out the flat because 10 men had just left after the party. “They would have known there were only three or four chaps in there,” she said.

The attack may be in retaliation for an incident in a Timaru hotel this month between occupants of the flat and members of the Road Knights, the onlooker said.