The mother of a 12-year-old Melbourne boy spoke with 3AW‘s Tom Elliot yesterday about the moment he allegedly found a needle in a cucumber.
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The news comes after swathes of copycat cases involving needles found in a variety of fruits, but primarily strawberries. There have been more than 100 cases reported to police alleging needles have been found in the small fruit, along with bananas and mangoes, with the first incident recorded on September 9 in Queensland.
The mother, who only gave her first name, Maria, told Elliot that her son had nearly swallowed “piece of thick wire” lodged inside a cucumber on Monday night. “As soon as he came out of his room he said: ‘Mum I found a needle in it’,” she said.
It’s happened again.
Distressed mother speaks after “panicking” son found contaminated cucumber » https://t.co/kPJV4vDcNc pic.twitter.com/kPzQjCPQ9R
— 3AW Melbourne (@3AW693) October 15, 2018
“I said: ‘come on stop joking’ and he goes: ‘Mum, I’m not joking’ and showed it to me,” she continued. “I was just beside myself … It looked as though it had been snapped with some pliers … it was curled on one end of it.”
Luckily, Maria’s son was only “pricked” by the object, but was pretty frightened by the ordeal. “He was so upset … he said, ‘Mum if I had swallowed it could I have died?’” she said. “He was just so worried … he was panicking.”
Maria said the cucumber was purchased from Woolworths at Devon Plaza in Doncaster East. A spokesperson from the company has told news.com.au that they’re working “closely with our supplier to assist the police as needed.”
A Victoria Police spokesperson also confirmed that they’re “investigating numerous incidents of what appears to be ‘copycat’ offending with reports of various other types of fruit contaminated across the state.”
No one ever wants to find a needle in a cucumber. If whoever’s doing this could stop putting shit inside delicious fruits, that would be mad.
