EXCLUSIVE: Witness describes morning rush hour attack by teens on Metro platform
WASHINGTON - Metro says a "wolfpack mentality" is behind yet another brutal mob attack at the hands of teenagers on Metro. This latest attack happened just before 8:30 a.m. Thursday at the Gallery Place-Chinatown station.
A witness who saw the assault spoke exclusively with FOX 5. He told us the platform was overcrowded and the teens waiting to get on the train seemed to be goofing off. But in just seconds, things got violent.
"I can see myself walking away just as the attack happens on the passenger behind me," the witness described to us as he looks at surveillance video released by Metro after the attack happened.
The witness was just feet away as the video shows a group of up to 30 juveniles storming passengers that were getting off a Red Line train at the height of the morning rush.
"He's shoved to the ground and probably five or six teenagers are punching him in the head, kicking him in the face," said the witness.
The 35-year-old male victim is tossed to the ground and repeatedly attacked by the teens.
"They were just yelling, 'Ándale! Move it, get off the train, move it, move it! Ándale! Move!'" the witness recalled.
What appeared to have started as random jeering and heckling very quickly escalated into a full assault.
"[The victim] seemed really kind of in a daze," said the witness. "A scratch across the top of his face that looked like it was bleeding. I could tell he had been punched in the face - possibly bruises to the face."
The victim was left on the ground as the teens rushed into the departing train.
According to the witness, he said he ran to the station manager who tried for nearly ten minutes to contact Metro Transit Police without any success.
"There have been several attacks on the Red Line, the line that I take every day, and I don't think there has been a proper response from Metro to protect their riders," the witness said. "I think there needs to be more of a police presence throughout the stations and on the Metro themselves."
Five stops from where the assault happened, police arrested five boys and one girl at the Woodley Park Metro station. All of them are students at Woodrow Wilson High School and they are facing felony assault charges.