The man accused of attacking a mother and young child in broad daylight outside Melbourne’s police headquarters has admitted the attack in a surprise confession.

Jerry Sowood, 27, of Sunshine West in Melbourne’s western suburbs, appeared in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday charged with affray, intentionally causing injury, two counts of unlawful assault, conduct endangering life, and conduct endangering serious injury. 

Sowood, who appeared on video link from the Melbourne West Police Station where he carried out the alleged attack just outside, told the court he would not hide from what he had allegedly done. 

‘Yeah, I’m telling what I did, and I’m saying there’s no family that was torn apart,’ he told the court. 

‘Even though I did what I did, the mum did not lose her child. Her child was not taken away from her. 

‘I took the scissors and I stabbed a woman in the hand … I’m just clarifying it.’

Sowood refused legal representation during the hearing, and further declined seeing a nurse in custody because it ‘wasn’t relevant’.  

‘I was in body sound and mind when I did what I did,’ he told the court. 

Jerry Sowood, 27, of Sunshine West, is he appeared on a website looking to be a flatmate 

An image appeared online reportedly showing the moment Sowood was hauled into custody 

‘Those three people, the kid got punched to the head. The scissors got taken out of my bag.’

The magistrate tried to stop the Sowood, but he continued with his admission. 

‘It’s probably best that you don’t go into the detail at this stage, okay?’ the magistrate told him. 

‘No, there’s no need to hide it,’ Sowood replied. ‘At least they’re both still breathing, you know. So I kept my humanity back. It might be somewhat traumatised.’

The Liberian-born budding rap star made no application for bail and was remanded in custody until his next court appearance in October. 

Daily Mail can reveal Sowood was a rapper, who posted a series of YouTube videos to a tiny audience and often went unviewed by anyone.

In one sinister post, he said: ‘The conclusion I’ve come to, human beings will never learn the meaning of humanity, unless there’s equal amount of bloodshed.’ 

In one of his rap videos, titled ‘Art of words, Knock, knock,’ Sowood rants about life and hardship.

Jerry Sowood rates himself as a poet and rapper 

‘My walls are higher than the Great Wall of China. Matter of fact, my walls are higher than all the walls combined,’ he rapped.

‘Metaphorically speaking, words are a sharp knife that can cut deep. I have disgust, I won’t pay you back. I will cut you deep.’

Sat on a couch dressed in a grey tracksuit, the urban poet continued:  ‘You need to learn to be savage. They’ll take your kindness for granted. 

‘They’ll twist it to their advantage. Break the habit of giving explanations. To those that don’t deserve it.’

Sowood’s other tracks include Sins of the Wicked, When Hope Peaks, Smooth and End Of The Beginning.

In another video, Sowood stands in his kitchen, which has a CCTV camera stuck on an air conditioning vent, and films himself eating for more than two minutes without saying a word.

In an advert on flatmates.com.au a year ago, Sowood described himself as a ‘reasonably understanding person’.

‘I’m a open book,’ he added.

Jerry Sowood posted a near three minute video of himself to YouTube eating

Sowood claimed he was an entrepreneur/game developer who ‘always wanted to go all throughout Africa’. 

‘Most of my time I’m monitoring my investments,’ he said.

Sowood listed his skills as ‘cooking and constructing’ and added: ‘I speak two languages. I’m obsessed with learning. I consider myself to be a nomad.’

Sowood complained about his lot in life, lambasting job agencies on the day of the alleged attack.

In various posts, Sowood lashed out about being broke, and moaning that he only had $5000 in superannuation.

‘The criminal system is good at criminalising people,’ he posted. ‘The criminal system. It’s a business.

‘Wrong is wrong. Equal, for equal. Repeated-repetition, reciprocal-reciprocity.’

In one another post on social media, Sowood listed his life goals, with making ‘life less difficult’ his number one aim.

Jerry Sowood in a kitchen that had a camera pocking out from an air vent 

His second was to ‘save to pay my mother respect’.

A woman claiming to be the mother and grandmother of those allegedly attacked, who Daily Mail has chosen not to name, earlier voiced her gratitude online for those who came to her family’s aid.

‘I would like to thank your son and the other guys for helping my daughter and grandsons,’ she wrote. 

‘It could have been a lot worse if they didn’t help. Thank you. It could have been a lot worse than it was. We are forever grateful.’

The mother and son, from Victoria’s Phillip Island, were on a family day trip to Melbourne, along with two other children aged 11 and 16, when they were allegedly attacked by Sowood, who was brandishing scissors. 

Footage of the incident showed six passers-by and tradies pinning down the alleged attacker. 

Melbourne West Police Station could be seen in the background of the footage.

Two police officers arrived soon after and took the man into custody after he had been subdued.

The alleged attack happened directly outside Victoria Police headquarters (pictured)

Bystanders apprehend a man after a boy and woman were allegedly stabbed in Melbourne’s CBD

‘So proud of my son today and the other guys,’ one of their mothers posted online later. 

While the men have been widely branded as heroes by Australians, many have expressed outrage that they were forced into action in the first place. 

‘We need a proper social cohesion policy by state government, not intentional division “laws”. Every criminal act by citizens is a reflection of political failure,’ one person wrote. 

‘The next question we should all ask ourselves is why do we need the corrupted government for, if we need to do their work plus pay tax,’ another added. 

Just hours after the incident, Lord Mayor Nicholas Reece again hit the airwaves to insist Melbourne was ‘safe’.

‘It is the case that over the last 12 months, the crime rate in the central city has come down by 3.7 percent,’ he told 3AW’s Jacqui Felgate.

‘But when you hear about incidents today, you know we’ve still got a long way to go, and I’m going to continue to keep pushing hard. 

‘We have been operating very closely with the police on these matters. We’ve got more police on the streets than ever before. 

The alleged attack happened in the shadow of Victoria’s largest police station 

‘At the moment, we’ve got our community safety officers on the street as well.’

Reece played down the alleged attack, declaring Melbourne was ‘a big city’.

‘We’ve also got to keep a bit of perspective here as well,’ he said.

‘You know, on a busy day, there’s more than a million people in the city, and while one, you know, criminal episode is absolutely one too many, we are a big city.

‘From time to time, we will have these terrible incidents.’

But the Lord Mayor’s comments were met with an angry backlash from locals. 

 ‘This is coming an all too often regular occurrence. In the past 10 years Melbourne has fallen into the biggest s*** hole of all of Australia. No one feels safe, nor are they safe,’ one said.  

‘Unfortunately in Melbourne a few heroes are dead. Melbourne is a shocking place to live,’ another wrote.   

Police attended to the mother and child after the alleged attack

The alleged attack comes under a year after sushi chef Wan-Ting Lai, then 36, was allegedly stabbed near the intersection of Little Bourke Street and Spencer Street, in Melbourne’s CBD, on October 2.

CCTV footage of that attack allegedly showed Lauren Darul, 33, run up behind her with a knife and a soccer ball, look her in the eye and stab Ms Lai once on the right side of her chest before running away. The case is still before the courts.

Reece also declared Melbourne’s CBD was not a dangerous place after that alleged attack.

Victoria Police Superintendent Zorka Dunstan told reporters she had witnessed Tuesday’s incident from her office just upstairs.

She said three people came to the family’s aid before police arrived to arrest the attacker. 

‘We had a citizen immediately intervene, who jumped onto him and just pulled him off the mum, and then the other two added assistance by grabbing him as well,’ she said.

‘Without the intervention, it could have been a lot worse, so we are so grateful for their assistance.’

The 10-year-old was recovering at The Royal Children’s Hospital, while his mother was at Royal Melbourne Hospital with injuries to her back and shoulders.

Supt Dunstan said the incident had also traumatised the family.

‘One of the boys was an 11-year-old, he was crying, I gave him a hug,’ she said.