Eyewitness gives account of bloody Harrison Street fight
Published on August 1st, 2001
STONEHAM, MA- A young man called The Stoneham Independent to explain what happened on Harrison Street on June 11.
“You had everything out of order, and it wasn’t right,” he said, in reference to last week’s story about the bloody fight.
With no police reports yet available, questions of chronology and background details were admittedly fuzzy. But something had to be said. He agreed, and he wanted to say more.
He gave his version of what happened:
A group of kids was waiting for a fight at a pizza place in Melrose. A car of Stoneham kids drove by. The Melrose kids may have assumed the car was the group they were waiting for backing out of the fight and passing by. Or the Melrose kids may have been set on trouble. Either way, two cars of Melrose kids left the pizza place and followed the Stoneham car.
The Stoneham kids drove to a friend’s house on Harrison St. A bunch of kids were at the house, but it wasn’t a party. No one was drinking. Friends were just hanging out on Wednesday night.
When the Stoneham kids got out of their car, some of the Melrose kids rushed them, swinging bats and spraying mace.
Yelling and screaming got the attention of the Stoneham kids inside the house, and they came running out. At this point one of the Melrose cars took off. The other Melrose car was driven by Eric Schille, 20, of Melrose. As the Stoneham kids rushed from the house toward the fight, Schille ran over the largest of the Stoneham kids and then backed up and revved his engine with the Stoneham kid still lying on the ground in front of the car. The rest of the Stoneham kids started toward the car, and Schille backed up onto someone’s lawn and sped away, leaving one Stoneham kid on the ground with both of his hips broken and one Melrose kid, who had been hitting kids with his bat and spraying mace, left alone to deal with the rest of the now hysterical Stoneham group.
At this point one of the Stoneham kids took the bat from the Melrose kid and beat him with it.
Then the police arrived. The young man who gave the above account was there, and he is obviously biased, but he did not try to make excuses for anything. He said he wanted the truth to be known. “We’re not bad kids. We were attacked,” he said.
Another witness not involved with the fight said the Melrose boy was screaming, “I don’t have what you want.”
The young man who was there said the boy was screaming “I didn’t do it. I’m not the one you want,” in reference to his friend who ran over the Stoneham boy.
The young man said he understands that the Stoneham kid who beat the Melrose kid did wrong, but he asks people to consider the circumstances.
“He was hitting us with a bat, spraying mace, and we just saw our friend run over, almost killed,” he said.
No one should have to deal with this. The sooner the whole story is out and all responsibility can be laid were it should, the better. Police are still investigating.
Note: The participants referred to as kids and boys are between 15 and 25. Specific ages are not yet available.
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