The Attack
While returning home, Lancaster and Maltby were subjected to a "vicious mob attack" from "a large group of people" between 01:10 hours and 01:20 hours on Saturday, 11 August 2007, at the skate park area of Stubbylee Park, Bacup (grid reference SD865218). The couple were walking home and came across a group of teenagers at the entrance to the park. The group followed them, but there was no trouble until some of them suddenly assaulted Robert Maltby without provocation. When he was knocked unconscious, the gang attacked Sophie Lancaster, who was trying to protect him by cradling him in her arms. A 15-year-old witness told police: "They were running over and just kicking her in the head and jumping up and down on her head." One distraught witness used a mobile phone to call for emergency services saying: "We need... we need an ambulance at Bacup Park, this mosher has just been banged because heβs a mosher." Witnesses revealed that afterwards, "The killers celebrated their attack on the goths β or "moshers" - by telling friends afterwards that they had "done summat good," and claiming: "There's two moshers nearly dead up Bacup park β you wanna see them β they're a right mess." The injured couple were assisted by some of the teenagers who called emergency services and then stayed with them and tried to tend their wounds. At the trial they were commended by the judge.
Police said soon afterwards that it was "a sustained attack during the course of which the pair received serious head injuries and their faces were so swollen we could not ascertain which one was female and which one was male." Both were hospitalised as a result of the attack, initially at Rochdale Infirmary. Maltby's injuries left him in a coma with bleeding on the brain. He gradually recovered, but was left with lasting brain damage. Lancaster, in a deep coma, was moved to Fairfield Hospital in Bury, then to the Neurology unit at Hope Hospital in Salford. It became clear to hospital staff that she would never regain consciousness, and on 24 August 2007 her family agreed to switch off life support.
Read more about this topic: Murder Of Sophie Lancaster
Famous quotes containing the word attack:
“Philosophy can be compared to some powders that are so corrosive that, after they have eaten away the infected flesh of a wound, they then devour the living flesh, rot the bones, and penetrate to the very marrow. Philosophy at first refutes errors. But if it is not stopped at this point, it goes on to attack truths. And when it is left on its own, it goes so far that it no longer knows where it is and can find no stopping place.”
—Pierre Bayle (1647–1706)
“Lesbian existence comprises both the breaking of a taboo and the rejection of a compulsory way of life. It is also a direct or indirect attack on the male right of access to women.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)