Three teenagers terrorised bus passengers as part of a mob that laid siege to the vehicle and pelted it with stones.
Passengers were showered with glass after stones were thrown through the windows of the bus as 30 youths went on the rampage after forcing the vehicle to stop in Arbroath Road last May.
Three teenagers admitted their role in the incident at Dundee Sheriff Court on Thursday. Jason O’Neill (16), Dens Road, and two 15-year-olds who cannot be named admitted breaching the peace on May 26 by forming part of a crowd chasing a bus and throwing stones and masonry at it. Not guilty pleas were accepted for three other teenagers charged with the incident.
The court heard that passengers had been picked up in St Mary’s at around 7.40pm and that the bus was travelling along Arbroath Road near its junction with Baffin Street when the driver realised the bus was being struck by objects. Depute fiscal David Cobb said, “He was unable to drive away as he came to a traffic light at the junction with Albert Street.”
Mr Cobb said one of the group although there was no indication it was one of the accused removed the cover of the bus’s rear engine and pulled the emergency fuel gauge, preventing the bus from moving.
“Witnesses saw two of the accused throwing stones at the bus and one of them climbed through its rear emergency door where he brandished a metal pole inside the vehicle,” he added.
A resident saw O’Neill throw a stone at the bus and CCTV footage later showed him carrying a large stone.
The court heard that the driver had been left “very shaken” and some of the passengers were so scared they left before statements could be taken, saying they wanted “nothing to do with it.”
O’Neill and the two others were traced and arrested. They were all charged with conducting themselves in a disorderly manner. One of the youths was further charged with brandishing the metal pole which he admitted in court on Thursday.
Sheriff Derek Pyle deferred sentence until April 7.