{"id":750524,"date":"2026-06-21T09:15:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T09:15:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/750524\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T09:15:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T09:15:12","slug":"man-charged-with-affray-after-school-bus-fight-in-southern-nsw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/750524\/","title":{"rendered":"Man charged with affray after school bus fight in southern NSW"},"content":{"rendered":"

Children travelling home from school in southern New South Wales have been left shaken after witnessing a fight on a school bus between two adults.\u00a0<\/p>\n

NSW Police said officers responded to the incident on Byrnes Road, Junee, about 4:30pm on Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Twelve-year-old primary school student Lilith McKay, who lives in Junee but travels to Wagga Wagga each day by bus, said from the moment she boarded, the passengers were disruptive.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Lilith says a year 11 student moved younger students away from the fight on the bus. (ABC Riverina: Jess Scully)<\/p>\n

“They were yelling at the bus driver and calling her evil,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Then they settled down a bit and \u2026 maybe that’s when one of the guys choked the other one with a cord.”<\/p>\n

The bus driver then reportedly pulled the bus over on Byrnes Road, about 3 kilometres south of the township of Junee, near an abattoir.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“[The bus driver] asked them to stop \u2026 and then one of the guys started headbutting the other one,” Lilith said.<\/p>\n

“There was heaps of blood everywhere.”<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

The bus waited near the Junee abattoir until police arrived. (ABC Riverina: Jess Scully)<\/p>\n

Limited transport options<\/p>\n

There is one public bus that travels between Wagga Wagga and Junee, and one train a day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“There’s three Junee buses that all school students catch,” Lilith said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“If you work in Wagga and you don’t have a car, and the petrol prices are pretty high at the moment as well \u2026 you catch the bus.”<\/p>\n

During the incident, Lilith texted her mum, Nicolette James, alerting her to the behaviour on the bus.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Because I work in Wagga, which is so far away, I posted online to see if someone could pick her up for me,” Ms James said.<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Nicolette James was able to see where the bus had pulled over to wait for police. (Supplied: Nicolette James)<\/p>\n

On the social media post, many residents, parents and community members expressed concerns about adults catching the bus alongside students, Ms James said.<\/p>\n

She said she did not agree, but the circumstance could have been avoided.<\/p>\n

“I don’t have an issue with adults catching the bus, but my understanding is they were [behaving antisocially],” she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“They shouldn’t have been allowed on the bus, especially it being a school bus full of kids.”<\/p>\n

A year 11 student called the police and pulled some of the younger students together away from the danger.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“[The student] was asking everyone if they were alright,” Lilith said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Lilith messaged her mum through a social media service during the incident. (Supplied: Nicolette James)<\/p>\n

At the scene on Byrnes Road, paramedics treated a 61-year-old man before he was taken to Junee Hospital.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Later that evening, the second man, a 52-year-old was arrested and charged with two counts of affray and two counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was refused bail and appeared in bail court yesterday where his bail was again refused.<\/p>\n

He will appear in Wagga Wagga Local Court on June 29.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Children travelling home from school in southern New South Wales have been left shaken after witnessing a fight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":750525,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[24278,64,63,1913,360304,163368,44,2733,1158,67410,107728],"class_list":["post-750524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-assault","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fight","tag-headbutting","tag-junee","tag-news","tag-nsw","tag-police","tag-school-bus","tag-wagga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=750524"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750524\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/750525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=750524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=750524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=750524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}