A 17-year-old who allegedly attacked a Sikh security guard in Bendigo, Victoria, alongside eight other teenagers has been refused bail.
The teenager, who cannot be identified due to his age, appeared in a children’s court on Wednesday where his lawyer said his “aboriginality is central to this bail application”, the Herald Sun reported.
The lawyer said any risk the boy posed to the community could be mitigated with strict conditions, remanding a child in custody should be a “last resort”, and asked for him to be released to live at his mother’s home as he had no criminal record.
But the prosecution argued the community was “petrified” over the alleged attack at Bendigo Marketplace on Monday afternoon which was caught on camera, and said the “risk is enormous” in granting the teenager bail.
The court heard CCTV and and social media allegedly showed the 17-year-old “king hitting” the guard in the face “completely unprovoked” while two co-accused teenagers hit him from behind.
The security guard allegedly had his turban ripped off, and allegedly had his head stomped on five times by the 17-year-old, leaving him with the imprint of a Nike TN on his face, the court heard.
Senior Constable Linzy Young told the court the teenager allegedly made full admissions to police about the incident, and alleged he was orchestrating unprovoked attacks for his friends to film and post on social media.
The court heard the teenager allegedly orchestrated two other unprovoked attacks on strangers, including a partially blind 22-year-old.
The court also heard that the teenager had not attended school in three weeks, was prone to violent outbursts, had an “unchecked drug and alcohol problem, and had been living in a tent with his girlfriend and hanging out with “negative peers”.
The magistrate ruled that the 17-year-old, who is charged with affray, intentionally causing injury, and recklessly causing injury, was an unacceptable risk to the public and remanded him in custody to face court again on March 19.
Two other teenage males, 14 and 16, were arrested and charged over the incident on Wednesday.
The 20-year-old security guard, who lives in Melton South, was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries but has since been released.
Header image: Left, right, the alleged attack at Bendigo Marketplace (Facebook).
