What started as an attempt to sell a PS5 ended with a young couple traumatised and the woman blind in one eye, following an aggravated robbery in east Auckland.
Patricia Pentecost headed to Glen Innes with her boyfriend, Mohamed, on Wednesday last week. They were set to meet a prospective buyer in the suburb.
Though the couple understood the buyer was a woman, Pentecost said she had already raised concerns about the buyer’s social media profile – suggesting it did not look trustworthy.
The pair arrived at a house near a construction site in Epping St shortly after 9pm but the buyer wasn’t home. Soon after, a young man approached the car and asked to see the PS5.
Kelly Hodel/Stuff
It was understood the PS5 purchaser was a woman but Patricia Pentecost said she had already raised concerns about the buyer’s social media profile – suggesting it did not look trustworthy.
The young man did not have any money with him, so Mohamed refused to let the buyer see the console. Almost immediately, two other young men arrived and Mohamed was hit in the back of the head.
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“He got dragged into the middle of the street, the three guys just started attacking him and I panicked,” said Pentecost. She got out of the car to try to defend her partner.
“One tried to punch him in the face, so I grabbed him and tried to pull him away, telling him to stop. I somehow grabbed the PS5 and tried to run away with it, thinking if I did they’ll get away from my boyfriend.”
Pentecost can’t remember what happened next but recalls the moment she was punched in the eye.
Kelly Hodel/Stuff
Patricia Pentecost and her partner spent the night in hospital; Mohamed had a cut on his face and a swollen eye, while Pentecost couldn’t see out of her damaged eye.
“It felt like a pole smacking my face, it hurt so much. I couldn’t stop screaming – it was so painful, I was just crying out for help but nobody came,” she said.
Police were eventually called, they arrived and the three young men “casually walked away” with the PS5.
Pentecost and her partner spent the night in hospital: Mohamed had a cut on his face and a swollen eye, while Pentecost couldn’t see out of her damaged eye.
Two days later she visited an emergency clinic in Greenlane, as the sight through her injured eye still had not returned.
“They checked my eye and saw some bleeding, the back of it had ruptured. They needed to do surgery to repair it as fast as possible,” she said.
KELLY HODEL/STUFF/Waikato Times
Two days later, Patricia Pentecost visited an emergency clinic in Greenlane, as the sight through her injured eye still had not returned.
Despite the surgery, Pentecost still can’t see through her left eye. She feels angry about the ordeal, in particular the fact the offenders still haven’t been arrested yet.
“They walked away on foot, how have they not been caught yet? I’m just really upset about it, if this happened to me as a university student, it could happen to anybody.”
A police spokeswoman said they were making inquiries into the incident and encouraged anybody with information to call 105, quoting file number 220525/2291.
Chris McKeen/Stuff
The Tāmaki district has been a hot spot for youth crime; a local Panmure resident told Stuff a vacuum in patrolling across the district made it easy for young people to get away with crime.
The Tāmaki district, which includes Glen Innes, has become a hot spot for youth crime in the past year.
A local resident in neighbouring Panmure said a vacuum in patrolling across the district made it easy for young people to get away with crime.
“I think it is clear crime is escalating across the electorate – it is happening across the country but it is an uptick for us,” said Tāmaki MP Simon O’Connor in March.
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