Two boys are lucky to be alive after an unprovoked attack with a knife left them lying on the ground in fear, pleading for mercy.
The suspect has not been caught.
Toronto Police say the boys, both 15, were making their way home from school when they were viciously assaulted by a stranger at about 4:45 pm Tuesday in a neighbourhood near Sheppard Ave E and Morningside Ave.
Mikeele McPherson, also 15, was not with the boys when they were hurt but saw them in the aftermath. On Wednesday he recounted his friends’ brush with death.
McPherson says the boys noticed a man they didn’t recognize on their heels. At first they thought he may just have the same path. But eventually they become suspicious.
McPherson says then on the sidewalk near a community mailbox, the suspect suddenly grabbed one of the boys, threw him to the ground and cut him with a knife. The other boy tried to intervene or help his friend get up and he too was cut.
“(The suspect) stated that ‘I want your life’,” McPherson said.
The attack came close to ending one of the boys’ lives.
One of the victim’s throats was slashed.
“The doctor told me the blade was one centimetre away from hitting his artery and he would have died in two minutes,” McPherson shared.
“He was very lucky,” confirms Toronto Police Det.-Sgt. Jim Gottell.
Gottell says the other boy was slashed across his chest but his injury was not serious enough to require hospitalization. McPherson says the friend he visited in hospital was sitting up in bed, smiling and cracking jokes.
Police officers were back near the scene of the attack on Wednesday looking for anyone who might recognize the suspect from a grainy image captured on surveillance video.
Gottell says officers are working under the assumption that he lives in the area which they hope will make him easier to find. Police are not sure how long the suspect may have been tailing the boys and are seeking video from the TTC to determine if he was with the boys on a bus before the sidewalk attack.
The suspect is described as a 5'8 white man with dark hair in a buzz cut and a full, short beard last seen wearing a white T-shirt and black pants.
If you think you see him, police want you to stay away and call 911.
With files from Russ Courtney