Woman who was beaten up in City Road shares images of her attacker – after police fail to
Police released the CCTV image on the left, but Micha says they were given the images on the right in a video shot on her friend's phone during the attack. - Credit: Archant
A woman who had her nose broken during a shocking late-night attack in City Road has handed the Gazette clear images of the thug who punched her – after the police failed to.
Micha, 31, had left East Bloc with two friends when a cyclist rode straight into one of them and went flying.
He then got up and confronted the group before punching Micha and her friend, who was knocked out.
The Gazette ran an appeal from police to identify the man earlier this month, but the CCTV images they released were of terrible quality and he has still not been caught.
Now Micha, who is “scared of her own shadow” knowing her attacker is still at large, has questioned why a video shot on her friend’s mobile was never released by officers.
In an effort to identify the thug herself, she sent stills from the video straight to the Gazette.
She said: “The CCTV is terrible quality. Even his own mum wouldn’t recognise him in that video.”
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Micha, who works for a tech company near where the attack happened, remains desperate for the man to be caught so she can move on with her life.
“Whenever I see someone who looks like him I feel unsafe,” she said. “I’m afraid of someone running up behind me again.”
Recalling the attack just before 3am on August 13, she added: “He was super angry and pushed me away to get to my friend. He was yelling about how it was our fault he fell over. My friend was drunk so he started arguing.”
After punching Micha and her friend, the man ran off. But as Micha was calling 999 he ran back.
She continued: “He said: ‘Are you okay?’ and I said: ‘Do I look like I’m okay? I have a huge bump on my head’.
“I said: ‘What’s your name?’ and he said it was Omar. I think he was on drugs or really drunk because him coming back was completely irrational. It made no sense. Then he flipped me off and ran off again.
“I ran after him and was yelling at people to stop him – and then when I went back I saw my friend had been knocked out. He’s OK now. He was really lucky.
“I’m not alright. I still have pain in my nose and it’s crooked. I have double vision in one eye. The doctors told me to wait four weeks – it’s been two months now and it’s still there.”
Anyone with information can contact Hackney police via 101, or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111, or crimestoppers-uk.org.