At 6am on Saturday morning, a Barrington Shopping Centre worker was left unnerved after witnessing a group trying to smash into The Warehouse with what looked like golf clubs and hammers.
The witness, who did not want to be named, was working near The Warehouse when he saw two cars pull into the car park at about 6am.
“It looked like early customers, which is nothing unusual . . . they parked just out the front of The Warehouse then backed up, which sort of made us stop and look and go ‘that’s really strange at this hour to have two cars parked parallel backed up’,” he said.
About seven people jumped out of the cars and began taking items from the boots before rushing forward and “smashing the sh*t out of the front door of The Warehouse”.
“(They were) trying to smash the front doors of The Warehouse using what looked like hammers and golf clubs. They made a few holes and they were kicking the absolute crap out of the doors.”
The store’s alarms activated, but the witness said the group appeared unfazed.
“Even one of the real short ones that looked like a real young kid was in there swinging like crazy.”
Eventually the group “obviously decided they weren’t going to get in” and turned away.
However, one of the group turned towards the shop the man was working in and appeared to raise a weapon briefly in his direction before heading back to the waiting cars.
“It was a little bit nerve-wracking. I didn’t know if they were adjusting their face covering or if they were threatening a weapon or what they were doing. I was hoping they weren’t going to come in to us.”
The man said his business opens at 6am and the incident now has him wondering whether they should be open at that time.
“What do we do? Do we lock ourselves in, do we not have customers, do we have to arm ourselves? There’s so much running through your mind.”
He was concerned at the brazen attitude of the attackers, who didn’t seem to care about committing violent crimes with people around to witness.
One of the group even appeared to be filming the attack, he said.

“You’ve seen it on the news for so long, you know it’s around, but it really hits home when you see it first-hand and know that they’re probably going to get away with it.”
The man said police were “amazing” and showed up “super quick”.
“They were there within a couple of minutes.”
Just over two hours earlier four young teenagers, including one who looked as young as about 11 or 12, smashed their way into MetroMart Sumner Beach, targeting vaping products.
The break-in lasted four minutes. One of the offenders waited in a car parked outside the store.
“They know what they’re doing. (It) seems like they know the store,” the owner said.
At 4.40am there was an attempted burglary at a commercial premises on Main South Rd. However, offenders did not gain entry.
Another break-in at two commercial premises on Weedons Ross Rd in West Melton happened at about 6.50am.
An apparent ram-raid at a service station on Withells Rd about 4.35am set off a fog cannon.
- By Melissa Nightingale and Heidi Slade