A 17-year-old Hunter Valley boy has been charged after allegedly hitting a passerby with a homemade blowdart over the weekend.
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9 News reports 15-year-old Cessnock girl Candi Hawtin was walking with friends on Saturday evening when a ute sporting P-plates slowed down nearby.
NSW Police will allege the boy fired the projectile from out of the vehicle’s window, striking Hawtin in the cheek while very narrowly missing her eye.
“I just thought someone had flicked me with a branch in the side of the face,” Hawtin told the network.
She said she only knew she’d been hit by a projectile when one of her friends told her “there’s a screw sticking out of your face.”
Hawtin called herself an ambulance and was admitted to Cessnock Hospital. She was then transferred to John Hunter Hospital, where the dart was surgically removed yesterday morning.
Citing medical professionals, she told reporters the damage could have been much, much worse.
“It was two centimetres away from my eye and half a millimetre away from the bone, artery and nerve in my cheek,” she said.
“If it hit that I could have lost the feeling in half my face and bled to death in eight minutes.”
NSW Police state the youth was arrested at Cessnock Police Station yesterday afternoon, and has been charged with reckless wounding and possessing or using a prohibited weapon.
He was granted bail and is scheduled to face a Children’s Court on Tuesday 11 December.
