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10
Feb 2023
Shocking video shows teenagers attacking police in Harrogate McDonald's
This video reveals the shocking moment three teenage girls attacked two police officers in McDonald's in Harrogate.
The footage shows punches being thrown at the officers on the first floor of the fast-food restaurant.
The video was taken last year. The Stray Ferret has waited to publish it until legal proceedings against all three girls had concluded.
The PCSOs both needed hospital treatment for facial injuries following the attack, which happened around 5pm on April 1 last year.
The three girls were aged 13, 14, and 15 when the attack took place. They cannot be named because of their age.
The officers had arrived on the scene to ask the girls to leave because they had breached an exclusion order preventing them from entering the building.
Two of the three girls were dealt with by police and the courts last year. One was dealt with out of court through a youth outcomes panel, while another was given a 12-month referral order and told she had narrowly avoided a custodial sentence.
The third, aged 15, was due to appear at York Magistrates' Court at the end of January. However, when a witness failed to appear, the case against her was dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service.
A court hearing in October had heard one of the PCSOs had required many months of treatment for her injuries and was still waiting to find out if she would need an operation.
The other PCSO had since left the force, the court was told.
A North Yorkshire Police spokesperson said:
Read more:
- Girl, 15, sentenced over police attack in Harrogate McDonald's
- Two PCSOs seriously injured after attack in Harrogate McDonald's
Town centre crime
It was one of a number of incidents that led Harrogate BID to begin a campaign calling for business owners and shoppers to report all anti-social behaviour and crime to North Yorkshire Police.
The BID argued people weren't reporting minor incidents in the town centre, leading to crime statistics that failed to fully reflect what was happening on the streets – and meaning police were not focusing their efforts in the area.
Harrogate BID manager Matthew Chapman said:
Please note that an earlier version of this article contained a video which has since been removed at the request of our regulator, Impress, to avoid any risk of identifying children under the age of 18 that had been involved in criminal proceedings and/or had not consented to being identified.
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