Mum’s hair pulled out as row in supermarket turns nasty

A woman says she had clumps of hair yanked from her scalp after she was allegedly dragged along the floor during an assault at a Christchurch supermarket on Thursday.

The woman, whom Sunday News has chosen not to name, also says she’s been left with bruising and scratches following a disagreement with two female shoppers at Moorhouse Pak’n’Save.

At about 1pm, she was shopping with her mother and toddler when a pair of women, believed to be sisters, took umbrage at her mother’s trolley blocking their way.

‘‘One said ‘don’t move your f ...... trolley will you?’ and mum and her had a verbal disagreement. Mum was like

‘you could ask nicely’.’’

The pair moved along the aisle before again encountering the sisters.

‘‘I had moved my trolley over to the side while I looked at biscuits and I didn’t see how it happened, but my trolley wheel hit one of their feet, and she thought I’d done it on purpose.’’

The woman tried to tip her trolley over while her sister yelled abuse.

‘‘I was turning around to the one yelling when the other one grabbed my hair and dragged me down, and that’s all I remember: being dragged along the ground.’’

Her mother estimated it took up to 15 staff members to stop the attack.

The victim says her scalp is swollen and sore where handfuls of hair were yanked out. Her daughter witnessed the attack and had been clinging to her since.

She was speaking out so people knew this ‘‘wasn’t a brawl, it was an unprovoked attack’’.

A police spokesperson says two women aged 31 and 32 were trespassed from the store and have been summonsed to appear in court in relation to the assault.