4 injured after man snatches elderly woman’s mobile phone, attacks 3 others in busy Hong Kong district
- The suspect, a two-way permit holder from mainland China, kicked the 67-year-old woman and seized her mobile phone in Kowloon City; he also attacked a man who was trying to stop him
- Attacker, 37, then smashed windscreen of a passing car with a knife he grabbed from a butcher shop and assaulted its driver, and hit a guest house employee
Four people were injured after a man robbed an elderly woman of her mobile phone in a busy district in Hong Kong and assaulted three others in a spate of apparently random attacks.
The man, a 36-year-old two-way permit holder from mainland China, kicked the 67-year-old woman and grabbed her mobile phone near the junction of Carpenter Road and Nam Kok Road at about 1pm on Sunday, according to Chief Inspector Ian Yan Hon-yeung of Kowloon City district.
A 60-year-old man who wanted to stop him was hit by the suspect with the phone, which fell to the ground.
The attacker ran southwards, and the woman gave chase for about 30 metres until she was assaulted by the suspect and fell down.
When he ran past a butcher shop on Nga Tsin Long Road, the suspect grabbed a meat knife and ran for another 600 metres to the junction of Nga Tsin Wai Road and Hau Wong Road, where he smashed the windscreen of a passing car with the knife.
The suspect then dropped the 39cm-long knife to the ground, opened the door of the driver’s seat and repeatedly beat the 27-year-old driver with his bare fists.
The two men struggled on the road briefly before the driver managed to stop the attacker by enveloping him in a bear hug, according to a video circulated online.
The attacker ran off to a nearby tenement building on Prince Edward Road West where he set fire to several items outside a flat on the fifth floor by reportedly igniting hand sanitiser, but the blaze was soon extinguished by a resident from the flat.