GARDAI have been alerted to two separate incidents of cyclists being violently attacked by an iron-rod-wielding youth gang in Dublin.
Both Yaman Umuroğlu and Liam Molloy were reportedly assaulted along the Grand Canal cycle path near the Bluebell area of Inchicore over the last few days.
Umuroğlu, who was attacked on Monday, shared an image of his dented helmet following the incident, saying that he was "ambushed" and "almost killed by a gang of lads armed with metal rods".
@maltanar I'm reaching out as the exact same events happened to me as I cycled home from work on Saturday evening. They ambushed me using a line of fire and surrounded me just before the Black Horse luas stop.They hit me with iron bars before I was rescued by a kind stranger 1/2 pic.twitter.com/qaDid3xxLC
— Liam Molloy (@MrAuPif) December 10, 2019
The group left him battered and bruised before stealing his e-bike.
He says he contacted gardaí and an ambulance but after waiting for 45 minutes other cyclists helped him into a taxi which drove him to St. James' Hospital.
The attack happened along the cycle route approaching the Blackhorse Luas stop and Umuroğlu says he was ambushed after he slowed down to get through a squeeze stile that requires cyclists to dismount.
After posting the image of his helmet online, Umuroğlu was contacted by Molloy who claimed that the "exact same events" happened to him at the very same spot on Saturday.
"I'm reaching out as the exact same events happened to me as I cycled home from work on Saturday evening. They ambushed me using a line of fire and surrounded me just before the Black Horse luas stop.They hit me with iron bars before I was rescued by a kind stranger," Molloy wrote on twitter.
The two spoke on RTE's Liveline this afternoon.
"So there was four or five 13 or 14-year-old teenagers waiting for me there with metal rods. And first I thought they weren’t going to give me any trouble because I’ve seen kids like that hanging around there before," said Umuroğlu.
"So I just approached them thinking that they would just go away, but then they started beating with metal sticks and wanted my bike. They got my bike in the end and I hobbled on the Blackhorse Luas stop while calling the gardaí.
"My arms, my legs, most importantly my head but I had a bike helmet on, thankfully. So the helmet is in pretty bad shape but my head is okay."
A Sledge hammer ?! Oh my god.. Well done for not stopping.. Hope you were ok.
Such a shame if we have to stop using this [otherwise] great infrastructure.— Liam Molloy (@MrAuPif) December 10, 2019
Molloy's experience was frighteningly similar.
"They stopped me, got me off the bike, and they were hitting me with the metal bars and with a few punches,” he said.
"They were really trying to hurt me. And one of the hits actually got very, very low on my helmet. If it had been a matter of centimetres lower it could have reached my actual skull. So I was very, very lucky."
It's alleged that one of the youths was even seen holding a sledgehammer.
Gardai released a statement saying that they'd received a number of reports of anti-social and criminal behaviour and that they would be deploying more officers in the area.
