Student assaulted by a group of teenagers in Grangegorman area

A 26-year-old student has told The Liberty how he was was assaulted by a group of teenagers in the Grangegorman area at about 11 pm on a recent Sunday evening.

The assault victim studies at TU Dublin and lives at a student accommodation in the area. For safety reasons he wants to remain anonymous.

The incident happened between the Broadstone DIT Luas stop and the TU Dublin city campus. The assault victim describes this as “a dark area with a lot of loose rocks” on the ground.

“I kept walking so they couldn’t surround me and protected myself against the rocks which were quite big”

Assault victim

“I think six or seven of them broke off [from the group] and started following me.”

When the student warned them “to back off” they would not leave him alone. The teenagers were threatening him, saying that they were going to “break his nose” while also making use of anti-Semitic insults.

Then, the group of teenagers physically attacked the student, kicking him in the back and throwing rocks at him. He was kicked five times and hit by at least two big rocks.  “They assaulted, harassed and threatened me,” the student said.

“I kept walking so they couldn’t surround me and protected myself against the rocks which were quite big.”

The student stayed calm during the assault and did not fight back physically as he wasn’t familiar with the self-defence laws regarding minors. He knew that there was CCTV filming the street, so he tried to stay in sight of the cameras while also leading the teenagers away from the rocks and onto the asphalt.

“I might have been able to run but I did not want to turn my back to them.”

After a few minutes the Garda arrived and tried to arrest the teenagers, but the group ran.  

At that point campus security also showed up, telling the student that they had been watching the assault and have it on camera. As the student didn’t call the police himself, he figured that campus security or another eyewitness must have seen what had happened and called it in.

His left elbow and right shoulder were sore from the assault, but mentally he is not affected.

The Garda and TU Dublin cannot comment on specific incidents, but the campus estates manager generally encourages “all campus users to report incidents as soon as possible to on-campus security and TU Dublin Estates so [they] can support the individual affected in making a report to An Garda Síochána.“

As the assault involves minors, any further steps taken by the police depend on their age.

After the police took the student’s personal information and statement about the assault, he left. The student doesn’t know if the Garda caught his attackers nor if someone got arrested.

The student has always felt safe in the area and will not avoid it in the future.

But he is hoping that the Garda will further investigate this assault and arrest his attackers. He is glad that the police arrived in time and that they handled the situation well.