Two teenage juveniles, identified as brothers, were arrested on Friday night for the assault days earlier of an Athens metro supervisor, a particularly vicious attack captured on mobile phone and widely shown over local news programs and on social media.
The 52-year-old man sustained broken ribs and a fractured nose after two young men were shown repeatedly kicking him on the concourse of the Omonia metro station, one of the main stops on the Greek capital’s subway network.
The reason for the assault, according to the victim and other witnesses, was his reprimand of the suspects for placing their feet on the seats and for not wearing a face mask, in line with Covid-19 precautions.
The two alleged suspects are locals residents and brothers, police announced.
Videotape footage taken from mobile phones as well as the metro station’s CCTV system clearly showed the perpetrators faces, although images shown on television had blurred out the faces.
Commuters videotaped the assault from inside the carriages, soon after the doors closed and the pair followed the victim out onto the concourse. Police patrolling at the station also failed to catch the perpetrators before they scrambled onto another train headed in another direction.
The attack was widely reported and commented on this week in the country, with the government, in fact, promising to assign a portion of the police force as special security for the metro network.
