Five people have been charged following a suspected hate crime which left a teenage asylum seeker fighting for his life in hospital.
The Metropolitan Police said the group will appear at Croydon Magistrates' Court following the attack in south-east London on Friday.
Scotland Yard said the victim was chased and subjected to a "brutal attack" after a gang discovered he was an asylum seeker.
Approximately 20 people were involved in the incident, which left the Kurdish Iranian 17-year-old with a fractured skull and a blood clot on his brain.
Neighbours claimed several people watched while the victim was kicked and beaten about the face. He remains in hospital in a serious but stable condition.
One resident of Shrublands Avenue, where the attack took place at 11.40pm on Friday, told the Press Association: "There were more than eight people, there was a massive group coming up from The Goat pub.
"You couldn't see who was hitting who.
"There was one person, the one who ended up in hospital, he was getting absolutely beaten up - kicked, mostly in the facial area. He was getting kicked and punched by everyone.
"There was a group of roughly 10 people that was kicking and punching him, and the rest, another 10 or 20, were all just around watching.
"Then when they heard sirens they started to go."
The resident said witnesses had to wait until the group moved off before they could help.
The attack has drawn widespread condemnation, with Tory minister and local Croydon Central MP Gavin Barwell describing the attackers as "scum".
Four have been charged with violent disorder and one with violent disorder and grievous bodily harm, police said.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel