This happened maybe five kilometres away from The Highrise and I find it just so distressing as a innocent worker was on his way home and brutally attacked resulting in life threatening injuries.
I feel uncomfortable doing this but look at the names of the offenders! This happened in one of our richest and probably safest inner suburbs of Melbourne. Houston, we have a problem.
If the allegations are true, ten years in the slammer each.
Girlfriend tried to shield unconscious DJ as he was brutally attacked in Toorak, court told
Marta Pascual Juanola
A Melbourne DJ was repeatedly kicked in the head by four attackers as he lay unconscious on the street during an unprovoked assault in Toorak in the early hours of New Year’s Day, a court has heard.
Police say Darrien Fisher’s girlfriend tried to intervene by using her body to shield him from the attack and was punched in the head herself before the group ran from the scene.
Fisher, who performs as DJ Dazz, suffered life-threatening injuries and had emergency surgery at The Alfred hospital on Sunday morning.
The 23-year-old is in an induced coma and remains in the ICU in a critical but stable condition, police prosecutors said.
Fisher’s alleged attackers – 19-year-old Michael Nous, 19-year-old Ayoub Abdulrahman, 20-year-old Mohamed Buram and 23-year-old Cleveland Momia – appeared in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Monday, charged with affray, assault and recklessly causing serious injury in circumstances of gross violence.
The court heard Fisher was walking back to his car after finishing DJing at a Sounds of Africa event at Jacksons Hotel on Jackson Street at 3am on Sunday when he found a group of men leaning against the bonnet of his white Jeep.
Police allege the group became irate after Fisher asked them to move away from his car, hurling verbal abuse at the 23-year-old before striking him repeatedly in the head, causing him to lose consciousness and collapse on the pavement.
The attack, which was captured by security cameras at a nearby Woolworths supermarket, continued as Fisher lay unconscious on the ground, with all four men kicking him in the head, groin and back, police said.
Fisher’s partner, Sharni Conroy-Green, attempted to use her body as a shield to protect Fisher and was struck in the head by the men.
According to police, Momia then said, “Boys, we need to dip, we need to get out”, before the group ran away from the scene, leaving Fisher unconscious and covered in blood on the pavement.
The men, who were filmed running east along Jackson Street by a witness, were arrested nearby.
Abdulrahman, Momia and Nous, all from Dandenong, made separate applications for bail.
Momia, who appeared without a lawyer and requested bail against legal advice, said he was “a bit intoxicated” during the attack and only remembered “glimpses, bits and pieces” of the night.
The court heard Momia had told the police he could not remember “the specifics of the actual offence” or “what kicked everything off” but claimed Fisher had thrown the first punch.
Buram appeared in court later in the day and did not apply for bail.
Magistrate Robert Stary described the violence as a “serious attack on a defenceless person” and rejected the trio’s applications for bail.
“In my view, it’s a serious allegation of recklessly causing serious injury in circumstances of gross violence and, in my view, there are no exceptional circumstances,” he told the court.
The group will return to court in March.
Posters of the party shared online by Jacksons Hotel show the event was marketed as a New Year’s Eve gala with performances from six DJs, as well as African drumming and free shots of alcohol for women. Footage of the event shared on social media shows a dance floor packed with revellers.
A friend of Fisher’s from the reggae music scene, who did not want to be named, described the 23-year-old as a “lovely” man who is always happy and loves his job.
“Dazz is a very good guy, almost every person who knows him will tell you,” he said. “He is very passionate on his career DJing. That’s what he loves most.”
He said he learnt about the attack on Sunday morning after friends began calling him asking about what had happened.
“I had to call some people I knew, and I found out that he was beaten after him finishing DJing, and he was going back home,” he said. “Very sad.”
Reading that report has made me feel quite sick.
ReplyDeleteAn ugly and senseless crime,
ReplyDeleteThank heavens Darrien did not die, When you kick someone like that you could easily kill them. Let's hope he makes a good recovery.
ReplyDeleteSend them up the river for a very long time. Nobody should have to endure that kind of brutality.
ReplyDeleteI hope the thugs were drug tested. Their out-of-control brutality and their forgetfulness afterwards sound bizarre :(
ReplyDeleteAaaargh.
ReplyDeleteCheck out this Toronto story. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/swarming-toronto-teen-girls-bail-1.6699519
ReplyDelete8 teenage girls charged with murder of a homeless man in December.
Horrible. This confirms my belief that it's best to be in bed by 11 p.m.!
ReplyDeleteHe was DJing at a Sounds of Africa event which might explain the presence of those from Sudandenong.
ReplyDeleteHow horrible!
ReplyDeleteIf sparklingmerlot is correct in them being Sudanese, I've read too many stories of young Sudanese gangs doing terrible things, not only to others, but gangs fighting amongst themselves. It seems they spend their days just looking for fights. It was a Sudanese youth who mugged and choked my son years ago now, left him for dead in the gutter, but M survived and called the police. Anyway, I agree, ten years in the slammer! Or more.
ReplyDeleteSo sad to read about this. It's so unfortunate that such things happen. I hope the guilty get punished. Here too we have such incidents of crimes happening, and it's scary at times to go out in the night.
ReplyDelete