“Oi, that’s where we sit.”
A Pokémon GO player has sustained serious head injuries after getting assaulted by a gang of teenagers.
Pokémon GO trainer Mark Fernyhough, 37, was violently attacked by a group of eight teenagers at a park near Canterbury on November 9. According to Fernyhough, he was sitting on a bench playing GO when the teenagers approached him and his girlfriend.
"We sat on these benches in the middle of the park and out of the corner of my eye I saw some shapes and then I heard ‘Oi, that’s where we sit,'" his girlfriend told Kent Online.
She got up to leave but noticed her boyfriend wasn't with her. When she turned around, she saw that Fernyhough was getting attacked by the teenagers. This included him getting hit in the head with park equipment. After the attack, Fernyhough was unable to walk, she recalled.
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"We sat on somebody's steps and the lovely neighbors let us in while we waited for the police," she added.
The police drove the Pokémon GO players to the hospital after seeing the state of the victim. Fernyhough needed to get a CT scan and staples in his head. According to reports, he is luckily recovering.
Unfortunately, however, the attackers are nowhere to be found. Kent Police are on the lookout for the teenagers but Fernyhough doesn't have much hope that they will be arrested. It was getting dark when the couple was attacked, leaving them unable to provide detailed descriptions.
Pokémon GO has led to violence in the past. In late October, a father and son beat up rival trainers in a park while trying to get control of a gym. Reports came out that said the 75-year-old father pinned down the victim under water while his son punched them repeatedly. The father was eventually convicted on third-degree assault charges.
"Grown men, including a man in his 70s, coming to blows over a childish game they are playing is ridiculous, but there was nothing funny about the injuries sustained by the victim, who could have drowned,” St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell said at the time.
