BOSTON — A 14-year-old boy has been arrested and will face assault and battery with a dangerous weapon charges after a mob of teenagers attacked an MBTA passenger at Back Bay Station on Tuesday, according to Transit Police.

TPD detectives arrested a 14yo male juvenile today for an incident from #MBTA Back Bay on 2/18/2026. The victim was kicked during the assault & struck the side of a departing subway train. The juvenile will face ABDW charges. The investigation is ongoing.— MBTA Transit Police (@MBTATransitPD) February 19, 2026

The victim was kicked in the face so hard he was propelled backwards into a departing subway train.

A nurse who witnessed the attack and helped treat the victim told 7NEWS the man was conscious after the incident but bleeding heavily from cuts on his face and head.

"Most people were just standing around," she said. "One woman fainted. It was definitely just the sheer amount of blood, definitely made some people very shocked."

The attackers fled in different directions, but two of the teenagers approached the first officer who arrived at the scene.

"These two teens run to the transit cop saying, 'there's been a fight, officer don't arrest me. He hit me and I hit back and my friends jumped in. I was like protecting myself,'" the nurse recounted. "He said that they were trying to steal his transit card."

When news of the attack first broke, Boston's progressive class on Reddit rushed to explain away the violence — describing the attackers as "bored, energetic, maybe poor (?), maybe disadvantaged (?) kids" who simply "need productive, healthy spaces to be in."

One of those "energetic" kids now faces felony charges.

The nurse, who said she regularly takes the Orange Line, added that the incident has made her uneasy around groups of teenagers at transit stations.

"It makes me a little bit weary, just around groups of teenagers that are causing a bit of commotion in the train station," she said.

The incident remains under investigation.