Boy, 14, with special needs ‘forced to eat twigs’

Gardaí in Co Cork say they are aware of an alleged incident in which a group of teenagers force-fed twigs to a boy with special needs and forced him to expose himself.

It was claimed yesterday the victim of the attack was a 14-year-old boy with autism and the incident occurred in Carrigaline.

It has been alleged disturbing footage of the encounter was then posted to Facebook.

Karen O’Mahony of the Masquerade Ball, a fundraising and awareness group for families living with autism, yesterday told the Opinion Line on 96fm she had been contacted by distressed parents, including one mother of a child with special needs who learned of the incident on social media.

“She was very distressed. She had come across this post from a teenage group that had stuffed some twigs down [the throat of] a boy with special needs, and he exposed himself, and they videoed it and they posted it up on Facebook,” she said.

“It was shocking to hear that a group of teenagers could be capable of this. It’s very distressing.”

Local shopkeeper John A Collins said he knew the victim very well as he often came into his shop to buy Match Attack football cards.

“He is a very inoffensive young man. It’s a horrendous thing to happen. It’s bad enough that you could do that to anybody, but particularly bad to do it to a child not capable of defending himself,” said the Fine Gael councillor.

Facebook said it could not comment on individual cases but it will remove graphic images when they are shared for sadistic pleasure or to celebrate or glorify violence.

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