Spanish yobs put Brit lad in coma
Saturday, August 8, 2009 @ 1:30 PM
A BRITISH schoolboy was in a coma last night after Spanish yobs attacked him for dancing with local girls. Mild-mannered Alex Hughes, 16, suffered a brain haemorrhage after one of the louts smashed a bottle over his head. He was on holiday in Majorca with three pals and their parents in the quiet family resort of Port d'Andratx. The four teenagers were attacked by three thugs who were laying in wait as they left a nightclub at 3am.
Yesterday Alex was in intensive care in the Spanish island's capital Palma with swelling on the brain. His dad Dr Dermot Hughes, 47, a consultant anaesthetist in neurosurgery, and nurse mum Helen, 43, have flown out to be at his bedside.
Dermot said: "All we can do is wait with our fingers crossed and pray he comes out of his coma."
Alex, of Radyr, near Cardiff, joined friends from Pentyrch Rugby Club for the two-week trip.
But in the nightclub they were jostled by three known troublemakers angry that they were mixing with "their" Spanish girls.
Dermot said: "The bouncers knew them and ejected them.
"Unfortunately for our boys they waited for them to leave, drove up in a car and attacked them.
"Alex was trying to escape but was hit on the head with a bottle.
"He began to feel unwell as he walked back to the apartment. He was taken to hospital and underwent an operation.
"Alex is a lover not a fighter. He has a quiet manner but is quick-witted - a lovely boy."
Family friend Neil MacInnes, 40, said: "Dermot has been looking at the scans on his son - and it has been quite distressing for him as the prognosis does not look good."
He added that rugby fan Alex "would not say boo to a goose".
Dermot - divorced from Helen - had just returned to work in his native Dublin after leaving Royal Gwent Hospital in Newport, South Wales. Helen works at Cardiff's University Hospital. Pals at Radyr Comprehensive School have set up a Facebook site in support of Alex, who has two sisters - Ciara, 12, and Jessica, 19. Spanish police said yesterday they were due to arrest a number of local teenagers.
Source: The Sun