After the race as the Leone motorcade was making its way to the village, rocks were thrown at the motorcade when it got to Malaeimi in front of the LDS Church.
A 9-year-old girl from Leone riding with her mother in their truck was hit.
The mother told KHJ News that rocks were being thrown at their motorcade from across the road. She had just told her daughter, who had been standing through the sun roof, to get down.
The motorcade had stopped and a group of people from Leone, including crew, got out of their trucks and cars and rushed to get the person(s) throwing rocks at them. A video shows the Leone supporters also hurling rocks towards a road behind a store across the road. The video was later removed.
The mother said a small rock fell through her truck’s sunroof and hit her daughter’s head.
“It was a small stone but it was flying from a high elevation and the gravity [of it as] it came down, is the reason it left a small gash in her head,” said the mother.
She was shocked when she saw her daughter bleeding. She took her daughter to the Leone EMS and after her wound was treated, her daughter was feeling fine.
“She’s such a trooper. She insisted she was okay and she dance with her Le Taupou Manaia group that night at the stadium,” said the mother.
A man in his 20’s, identified as the person who threw the first rock at the Leone motorcade, received a head injury and was treated at the hospital. He posted an apology on Facebook to the people of Leone for what he did.
