A 39-year-old man was struck with a brick when one of the homeless Long Street boys attacked him on Friday morning.
The incident happened in front of the Long Street exit of Mike Lessick Hardware at around 10am.
“I bought a phone for one of my friends from one of the street kids two months ago, after he begged me to buy it from him for R150 because he needed milk for his child,” Francois Kadilu explained.
”I told him I only had R100 but that it could help him out. He sold it to me and I told him not to follow me or bother me again.”
Johannes Majozi, a 24-hour security officer for Mike Lessick, witnessed the whole fight and tried to help the man who was attacked.
“I just saw one of the street kids attacking this guy, screaming that he owed him money. Then five other street kids came and hit the guy,” he said.
”They kicked him so hard that I thought they were going to kill him. I tried to get the boys off of the guy but they started to hit me; one of them took my baton and threw it aside, and another boy threatened to stab me with a knife.
”I went back into the premises and we phoned the police.”
The street children who attacked Kadilu alleged he still owed him R50 for the cellphone.
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“I told him I didn’t owe him anything and that I told him, on the day I bought the phone, that I could give him only R100 for it.
”He wouldn’t understand reason, picked up the brick and started hitting me with it. There must have been more than five guys on top of me.”
Kadilu suffered minor injuries to the left side of his face and the back of his head.
Kempton Park SAPS spokesman, Capt Jethro Mtshali, commenting on the Long Street street children at a previous occassion, said: “This is a societal issue that needs the involvement of various community-based organisations and other government departments, such as Social Development,” he said.
“We will not be commenting on the same matter, as this matter is receiving attention and local government is also trying to assist.
”It is not a criminal matter to be homeless, however, if homeless people commit crime we will not hesitate to bring them to book.”
Paul Hartman, yard manager at Mike Lessick Hardware, said there were countless people who were too afraid to walk past the street children, because they attacked passers-by in a group.
“The people who give food and blankets to them must know they are helping criminals and the longer they feed them, the longer they will stay. We need them off the streets.” said Hartman.
Numerous shops have moved from the corners of Monument Road and Long Street due to the crimes the street children commit.
