300 juveniles involved in massive brawl for planned meet up at NJ mall
EDISON, New Jersey (WABC) -- Several teens were arrested after a brawl broke out at the Menlo Park Mall in Edison, New Jersey on Saturday night.
The chaos erupted after hundreds of teens showed up for a gathering planned through TikTok.
One officer was injured in the mayhem.
It started with a call out days before by a social media influencer for his followers to descend on Menlo Park Mall on Saturday night.
"They were having a brawl, they were pushing and shoving, when our officers arrived, they actually started fighting with our officers," Chief Thomas Bryan with the Edison Police Department said.
Three-hundred juveniles were so out of control that police from surrounding towns had to respond as well.
It took about an hour and a half to break up the gathering.
Seven juveniles were arrested, mostly for resisting officers, none of which were from Edison.
One was arrested for assault on an Edison officer.
All of the juveniles were released to their parents eventually.
On Monday, Edison Mayor Sam Joshi spoke about the incident and partially blamed the teenagers' parents.
"What are the parents doing? Aren't the parents aware that they're traveling 45 minutes to cause a disturbance within Edison Township? It makes no sense. Parents need to be focused on their kids, making sure they're not causing this kind of rowdiness in other towns," Joshi said.
The mayor is placing the rest of the blame on Simon Properties, which owns the mall.
He said its plan to handle an out-of-control situation like the one over the weekend is very inadequate.
"We expect them to have more license plate readers throughout the property, more cameras throughout the mall, as well as the parking deck. We wanted to ensure they significantly ramp up their private security within the mall," Joshi said.
Menlo Park Mall released a statement on Monday, saying, "The behavior during Saturday night's incident is not tolerated at our property."
They thanked law enforcement for their quick response, and the arrest of several individuals.
"The safety and security of our retailers, employees and customers is our highest priority," Menlo Park Mall said. "We deploy around the clock patrols by a team of trained security professionals, supported by patrols by paid off-duty and on-duty police officers. Menlo Park Mall is also supported by real-time video surveillance of our property as well as license plate readers that provide real time alerts to EPD."
The mall says they will be increasing police and security.
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