Young children were left screaming during a traumatising attack in which two masked thugs smashed in the windows of a dad’s car.
Aarron Grundy, 27, was at home with his two sons – aged five and 12 months – on Devonshire Road in Atherton, Greater Manchester, when he watched, shocked, as two men smashed at his car’s windows with golf cubs. The brazen broad daylight attack, which took place at 12pm, was captured on CCTV, and showed the men bashing holes into the windscreen.
The two thugs, seen dressed for winter in coats and hats, rushed at the family’s home on January 19 and inflicted damage on the car before turning to the property and shattering the glass in the front room. Mr Grundy has told how the glass cracks sounded like “gunshot noises”, and left his oldest son “hysterical”.
Speaking to the Manchester Evening News, the dad said he rushed to his children from the kitchen after he heard a “massive shatter”, and scooped up his 12-month-old, who was sat in a high chair behind one shattered window. He said: “I went in the kitchen and all of a sudden, I heard what sounded like gunshot noises.
“Then I heard this massive shatter. I ran into the living room, and my eldest was hysterical. I looked up and the front window had completely gone. I was trying to duck to get my 12-month-old, who was sat in his high chair, right in front of the window they had just smashed.”
Distressing pictures captured on nearby CCTV showed the hooded men vaulting a wooden fence to smash the car outside the house, and the aftermath of the attack outside the front room. Mr Grundy added he feared one of his children “would be shot” when the attack took place.
He continued: “There was glass everywhere. My five-year-old was running around screaming and didn’t know what to do. He was screaming the place down. I’ve never heard them both cry like that. All of it is a blur. I keep replaying it in my head. I went to the window and saw them both running off.”
While he believes the attack was a case of mistaken identity and police have launched an investigation, his son has been left traumatised, and “won’t forget” the events of January 19. He said: “These people don’t understand the trauma it brings to someone’s life. I am now out of work with no vehicle. It’s horrific for this to happen and think that you can’t even be safe in your own home.”
Greater Manchester Police has launched an investigation in a bid to trace the offenders, one of whom left fingerprints on the dad’s car during the attack. The service said in a statement that no arrests have been made, adding officers were called following the incident at around 12pm.
A police spokesperson said: “At 12pm on Sunday 19 January, we were called to Devonshire Road in Atherton to reports of criminal damage, where it’s believed a car and a property were smashed up. No arrests have been made at this stage, but an investigation is underway.”
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