A TEENAGE boy was attacked by a passenger who saw red when a snowball hit the car in which he was travelling.

The man, in his 30s, wrestled the 13-year-old boy to the ground before punching him in the face.

Youngster Glen Crosier had been taking part in a snowball fight with a group of friends before the attack.

A stray snowball hit the car, believed to be a T-registration silver Ford Ka, as it travelled along the A167 in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear. The driver pulled into nearby Cedar's Green, where the boys were playing.

Glen's mother, Jill, said yesterday: ''A man got out of the passenger seat and grabbed hold of Glen, pushed him to the ground, then kicked and punched him so hard in the face that it closed his eye.

''He then said, 'go and get the person who threw the snowball and I will give him the same'.

''It is totally horrific and unbelievable. Children cannot even go and play in the snow now without this kind of thing happening. You cannot get away with a fully-grown man going on like that with a 13-year-old boy.

''Even if one of them has thrown a snowball at the car, nobody deserves the injuries that he has."

Glen, of Low Fell, Gateshead, said: "I knew the man might shout at us, but I didn't expect him to attack me like that.

"I didn't mean for the snowball to hit his car. It was an accident, but he was in a rage. I was trying to say sorry, but he was so mad he wasn't listening. It was really scary."

Police are investigating the attack on the boy, who attends Joseph Swan School. It happened on December 30, at 2.30pm.

A Northumbria Police spokeswoman said: "We did get a report from the boy's mother and we have been out to see the boy.

"We are investigating the fact that they were throwing snowballs when someone, a passenger, got out of the car and there was an altercation."

The attacker is described as white, of stocky build, and with thinning ginger hair