Screams, blows and blood on the capital's tram No. 11. Three students were attacked in broad daylight by a group of young men dressed in black, with shaved heads and a thirst for violence. Without reason, without warning - simply because they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
We can call them locales, skinheads or just agitators. These are kids who terrorize other kids. One of their latest victims is an 18-year-old boy - quiet and shy. We are hiding his identity because he does not know what else could happen to him.
“I was hit and right now my eye is black, I have a wound on my ear, and the blow with the bottle broke it and left me with a wound“, the boy told “Wake Up”.
All this happens in broad daylight on tram number 11, last Sunday. Ten boys are riding in the back.
“At first we didn't pay attention – "There was some kind of agitation, we assumed they were football fans," the victim said.
According to him, the aggressors were between 15 and 18 years old, with a messy hairstyle and dressed in black.
“We decided not to pay attention to them“, he added.
But their presence turned out to be a threat. One of the attackers approached the group with an aggressive question.
“He came to one of my friends, asked him a question and started pushing him towards the door. Another of the attackers reached out to hit me, I swung my hand to protect myself. They just started hitting me on the head and stuck a glass bottle in my head“, the boy says.
The fight lasted for several minutes. When the tram stopped at a stop, the injured boy's friends managed to pull him out of the melee. By chance, a police patrol was moving behind the tram – an ambulance was also called.
The injured person does not know the attackers. He has only heard rumors about the “locals”.
“This is the first time I have come across such a gathering. I did not expect something like this to happen to me – or at least not at that moment”, he says.
The SDVR confirmed the case to NOVA. Two people have been detained – a 16-year-old boy and a 31-year-old man. The minor is known to the police and has been detained before for theft. He has been charged with hooliganism and the Children's Pedagogical Room is working with him. The adult man has been charged with minor bodily harm for hooliganism. The police specify that the group is not classified as a “local“.
The team is following the trail of these groups of children dressed in black. Viktor and Kaloyan are known on social networks as “Pedophile Hunters“. Recently, they have also been patrolling the trail of “local“.
“Most often, youth groups from different neighborhoods come, gather on the food floor, where they waste their time“, says Kaloyan Nenkov.
“We can call them that – they are mixed, they are still in black, they walk in groups, they look alike“, says Viktor.
“A sense of self-confidence arises that they are healthy, cool, that they have girls around them. Most often, the problems are with laughing gas, marijuana candies – they are sold and consumed in this environment“, adds Kaloyan.
The two say that sometimes the girls in these groups can be more aggressive than the boys.
“The local girls are braver – I have seen them pulling each other's hair and fighting more often“, emphasizes Viktor Chakarski.
And while these children continue to walk around the malls and streets of Sofia, the beaten boy is still experiencing the stress of what happened. He hopes that there will be consequences for every manifestation of aggression – from any group.
“All such gatherings will gain more and more self-confidence and become more and more aggressive, until finally, perhaps, someone dies. No one is safe – we do not live in a safe place“, concludes the victim.