Five teenage boys armed with baseball bats and a machete invaded a Sydney high school yesterday, smashing classrooms and injuring several students and a teacher, police said.
Merrylands High School in Sydney’s west went into “lockdown” with pupils confined to their classes as the intruders assaulted students and shattered windows before police arrived and arrested them.
Anxious parents of the students gathered outside the school as news of the attack spread, later escorting their children home as they were allowed out.
One father with a 13-year-old boy at the school said he had been given little information about his son’s welfare.
“My heart’s still pumping, I was really worried,” he said.
“Police were called to the high school on Sherwood Road following reports a number of males had entered the school grounds,” a police spokeswoman said.
“They allegedly damaged a number of classrooms [and] a number of students received minor injuries,” she said. “Some were assaulted by the group and others received injuries from the flying glass.”
Police were still trying to establish the motive for the attack in the blue-collar neighborhood, as an education department spokesman said the five boys were not students at the school.
“The information to us is they were coming here ... seeking someone,” Detective Inspector Jim Stewart told Macquarie Radio.
Asked whether the attack could be retribution for something, he said that was possible.
“We’re a bit confounded as to the reasons why,” he said.
One student was admitted to hospital for treatment of a minor facial injury and a teacher was taken to hospital with bruising to the back of the head after trying to restrain one of the attackers, a spokesman for the ambulance service said.
“We’ve assessed 18 school-aged children ... all having minor injuries, some lacerations, some bruising and they’re obviously quite anxious about what has happened,” the spokesman said.
Police said five youths, aged between 14 and 16, entered the school through the main gate at around 9am and stormed an assembly in an outdoor quadrangle.
They then ran through the corridors of two school buildings, smashing windows and showering students with glass.
When police confronted the youths, they dropped their weapons and did not resist arrest.
Stewart said he was stunned by the brazenness of the incident.
“It beggars belief they would attempt this kind of activity against innocent students,” he said.
New South Wales police Commissioner Andrew Scipione said police were continually working with the security branch of the education department to ensure the state’s schools remained safe.
“We have seen over the past year or two an increase in the number of Internet-based alerts, for instance, that we’ve had where people have been contemplating violence,” Scipione said. “It’s always a concern when we see violence in our schools.”
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
‘A THREAT’: Guyanese President Irfan Ali called on Venezuela to follow international court rulings over the region, whose border Guyana says was ratified back in 1899 Misael Zapara said he would vote in Venezuela’s first elections yesterday for the territory of Essequibo, despite living more than 100km away from the oil-rich Guyana-administered region. Both countries lay claim to Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and is home to 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens. Guyana has administered the region for decades. The centuries-old dispute has intensified since ExxonMobil discovered massive offshore oil deposits a decade ago, giving Guyana the largest crude oil reserves per capita in the world. Venezuela would elect a governor, eight National Assembly deputies and regional councilors in a newly created constituency for the 160,000
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
RSS