Scooter murder’ boy’s dad fighting for life with Covid
He may not know his son has died
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THE dad of a boy stabbed to death “for his electric scooter” is fighting for his life with Covid-19, a family friend has said.
Fares Maatou, 14, was hit with an iron bar and knifed while wearing his school uniform on Friday afternoon.
The family friend said they did not know whether his father knew of Fares’s death.
He is said to have spent a year in hospital and emerged from a coma six weeks ago.
The friend, who did not want to be named, said: “This is a terrible tragedy. The family have been through so much.
“We didn’t know if his dad was going to pull through.
“He’s still critically ill under intensive care and now they have lost their youngest son.”
Fares, who had an older brother, and two sisters, was blind in one eye following an incident when he was a young child, the friend added.
He is the eleventh and youngest teenager fatally stabbed in London this year.
Two boys aged 14 and 15 have been arrested on suspicion of murder, the Metropolitan Police said yesterday.
A second 15-year-old was also arrested over the attack.
Yesterday, several boys with tears in their eyes laid flowers at the scene in Canning Town in East London.
One said of Fares: “He was a kind person who loved everyone and wouldn’t start trouble. We were in the same class and used to hang out at lunch.”
He said Fares told him he would not be at school on Friday, to avoid detention, but wore uniform to look as though he would be.
The boy added: “He was walking here with JB, one of his friends, when they tried to take his electric scooter.
“They were going to attack JB, but Fares jumped in front of him and was hit over the head with a metal stick.” A witness who tried to help Fares as he lay dying said: “One of the guys had a knife, the other had a big iron bar. There were about five of them.
“We tried to help. I checked his pulse, but he was gone.”
A business owner who saw the attack said one of Fares’s friends had desperately tried to give him mouth-to-mouth.
Another family friend said medics tried to save him “for over an hour”.
DCI Perry Benton appealed for information and added: “Fares’s family are, of course, absolutely devastated.
“I have assured them of my total commitment to bringing to justice those responsible for this senseless killing.”