After Indians, now Canadian assaulted in Australia

tags - Canadian assaulted, australia, Indians, Indian students, attacks

After a recent spate of attacks on Indian students in Australia, it was the turn of a wheelchair-bound Canadian man who was beaten by Australian teenagers in Sydney on Tuesday, reports in Toronto said.

Heath Proden, 35, from Winnipeg suffered skull fracture in the assault and is waiting for surgery in a Sydney hospital, reports said Wednesday.

Proden, incapacitated since the age of 10, was in Sydney to attend a concert by his friends' band called Doc Walker Tuesday night.

His anxious mother Shellan Proden told the Canadian media on Wednesday that she was shocked to receive a call about the assault on her disabled son.

"I was devastated. He was having such a good time there," she said from Winnipeg Beach where her son lived with her.

Canada's Canwest News Service said Proden was waiting for a train in Sydney following the concert when he was approached and verbally harassed by two teenage boys.

Proden tried to leave but he was punched in the face and knocked from his wheelchair.



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