An eastbound Skytrain departs from Main Street-Science World Station in Vancouver, Jan. 8, 2013. Two teenage girls are accused of going on a violent rampage Monday night along a SkyTrain line, allegedly stabbing two people and assaulting another person before being arrested, according to transit police.DARRYL DYCK/The Globe and Mail
Two teenage girls are accused of going on a violent rampage Monday night along a Metro Vancouver SkyTrain line, allegedly stabbing two people and assaulting another person before being arrested, according to transit police.
Shortly after 11 p.m., the teenagers, 14 and 15, confronted two women across the street from Gateway Station in Surrey, police say. The two teenagers started an argument with the women. The group separated, with the two women heading up a staircase to the station.
That's when police allege that one of the teenagers stabbed one of the women with an eight-inch serrated steak knife that had been hidden in her sleeve.
"I've seen the video … She [the teenager] runs up the stairs and lunges at the woman and literally thrusts the knife into the woman's arm," said Constable Anne Drennan.
The victim and her friend apparently ran away and boarded a train to Surrey Central Station where paramedics were waiting on scene.
Police then received information the two teenagers were at Scott Road Station. On a train heading from that station to Columbia Station in New Westminister, the two allegedly threatened a passenger with the knife. The 15-year-old stabbed a seat "so hard that the knife actually bent," Constable Drennan said. When the train arrived at Columbia Station, the passenger got off the train and the two teenagers followed her off and assaulted her, said Constable Drennan.
The two then jumped back on the train, and rode it to Joyce Street Station. At this point, transit police were one stop behind them, Constable Drennan said.
At the station, the two teenagers got off and went to an area of the station where there is a pizza shop and attempted to stab a young man, said Constable Drennan. The man apparently defended himself with a pizza box he was holding.
"The one with the knife was completely and utterly out of control," Constable Drennan said. "If he [the young man] hadn't had the pizza box, things would have been very different for him." The man suffered a stab wound to one of his fingers.
The altercation at Joyce Street Station took place at 11:57 p.m., Constable Drennan said, and police arrested two teenagers just minutes later, approximately a block away from the station.
Constable Drennan said the acts were random, and none of the victims know the two teenagers. Only the first assault victim was taken to hospital and has since been released, she said.
She added that the two teenagers are known to authorities, and since January, 2012, have had a combined total of 142 interactions with police. She said that the two are part of a "loosely organized group of young people who commit crimes largely along the transit system."
She did say, however, that the violent nature of Monday night's assaults was rare.
"I want to reassure people that they shouldn't feel frightened about using transit because they think they're going to be randomly attacked," she said. "It's something that really doesn't happen very often."
Police have recommended charges of assault with a weapon, assault causing bodily harm, threatening, carrying a concealed weapon, and possession of a weapon dangerous to the public, Constable Drennan said.