Warning: This story contains details that may be disturbing to some readers. Discretion is advised.
Metro Vancouver transit police have recommended multiple charges against a man accused of attacking and biting a group of girls on the SkyTrain last week.
Connie Tobias, whose niece was one of the victims, told CKNW’s The Jas Johal Show the trio were on the train at the Main Street-Science World station around midnight, when a strange man started taking pictures of them.
The girls asked him to stop, and when he didn’t one of them took our their own phone to get a picture of him.
“And he lashed out,” she said.
Transit police said the man punched one of the girls in the face, before putting a second girl in a headlock and kicking her.
When the third girl tried to free her friend, the man allegedly bit her on the hand, police said.
“So the thumb was not bitten off — at first they thought it was, because there was a large amount of blood, and later found out that it was intact, the tip of the thumb was what needed surgery and the nail has been bitten off … and just a few broken bones,” Tobias said of the bite injury.
“They’re traumatized, obviously, and they’re no longer using public transit.”
Police said another bystander intervened in the altercation and was also allegedly bitten on the arm, while another passenger pressed the security alarm on the train.
The suspect got off at Joyce Station and fled, but police were able to locate him nearby and arrest him.
Along with the grisly injury to the girl’s thumb, police said the other victims suffered bruises and swelling.
Tobias said her niece is having trouble sleeping since the attack and has developed a fear of the dark.
She and the other girls are relying on family members and ridesharing apps to get around, as they no longer feel safe on the transit system.
“I don’t know if we can point fingers directly at one individual or one community or department — but I mean the police can only do so much,” she said.
“Even if this individual were to be taken away, where are they going to put him? I don’t know if he belongs in a jail or if he belongs in a mental hospital, and do we have the facility and the capacity to deal with the large number of people like him on the street?”
Transit police said the suspect, a 33-year-old man from New Westminster who was not known to police, was released on conditions and is due back in court on Sept. 26.