A boy aged 12 was recovering in hospital today after being stabbed yards from his home near an east London takeaway where a 16-year-old girl was shot dead five years ago.
The victim was knifed repeatedly in the chest and back yards from the fried chicken shop in Hoxton when he went to collect a take-away for his mother.
Gang squad detectives are investigating links between the attack and another stabbing earlier on a 19-year-old man near-by.
The boy collapsed after being ambushed by a gang close to Hoxton Chicken and Pizza shop in Hoxton Street at around 10pm on Tuesday. The take-away is where Agnes Sina-Inakoju was fatally wounded in a gang related attack in April 2010.
At first the boy’s injuries were believed to be life threatening but his condition was today described as stable in hospital.
Residents today said the child had been the victim of a postcode turf war between gangs on rival estates and was “in the wrong place, at the wrong time.”
Witnesses spoke of their horror as the boy lay in a pool of his blood crying out: “Please help me, get me an ambulance, I’ve been stabbed.”
They described how his mother rushed down from their home on the eighth-floor to be with him as other neighbours tried to stem the bleeding before paramedics arrived.
One said: “His mum was hysterical. She was crying, wailing. She was crying out on the phone to someone while she was with him.”
A family friend said: “They came out of the car and stabbed him seven times. They stabbed him just because he lived in the area.
“It’s all gang related, it’s just about what side of the street you live or what estate you live on.”
In a further knife attack last night a 17-year-old boy suffered a slash wound and was said to be stable in hospital.
Four men and a 16-year-old girl were arrested after the incident at around 10.32pm in Woolwich Road, Greenwich.
One of the men was knocked off a moped by a car and police said they had seized a number of weapons in the suspected gang related incident.
In a separate incident, a 14-year-old boy was taken to hospital after arriving at Deptford Green School in Lewisham at 8.40am yesterday with a stab wound to the thigh. A 13-year-old boy was later arrested and was being questioned by police today on suspicion of causing grievous bodily harm.
A knife was recovered after the attack, which is believed to have happened in Avonley Road at around 8.50am.
The incidents come as police are battling a near 25 per cent rise in knife crime injuries among under 25s in London.
