The Newstalk ZB political editor told the Herald his son Hugh was attacked on a walking track in Karori last night.
The 21-year-old has no memory of the attack, which happened just after midnight. It left him with a suspected fractured skull and brain bleed, a broken eye socket, and possibly a broken collar bone and rib.
"He was on a walking track going home from town in Wellington to Highbury last night and he suspects he was jumped because his cellphone was stolen," Soper said.
"The first thing he can remember is the flashing lights of the police car and an officer shining a torch at him."
Soper said Hugh, the youngest of five children, called him from the hospital first thing this morning and the broadcaster had been by his son's side ever since.
When Soper spoke to the Herald this afternoon, Hugh was having his second CT scan.
The incident follows another attack in July when Soper's other son, Henry, was stabbed on a night out in Wellington CBD.
Henry, 23, was leaving a bar in Courtenay Place in the early hours of July 28 when he got into an argument with a man he didn't know, who is alleged to have pulled a knife.
Soper said Henry put his arm up to fend off the blow but the knife went through his forearm, slicing nerves, tendons and damaging an artery.
Bleeding heavily, Henry was taken to hospital.
Soper did not believe the attacks on his two sons were linked but were likely the result of random events.
"This was clearly just a random attack," he said of last night's attack. "He didn't even see it coming, it just happened.
"It is absolutely appalling. After my second son was stabbed about three months ago, and now this is my youngest son, this is extraordinary.
"There is clearly so much violence out there that you don't realise."
Soper said having two sons attacked in a matter of months was a terrible thing for a parent to deal with.
"It is terrible because as a father you can't do anything and you can't be with young men 24/7. It is an absolute shock and very upsetting.
"I have never confronted violence before or been subjected to it, until this year, so it goes to show we live in a society that is not the old land of milk and honey that it once was."
He said despite the injuries, Hugh was coping "pretty good".
"He is bewildered because he can't remember what happened, but other than that he is in pretty good spirits."
His other son, Henry, was also still coming right after the July stabbing.
"He still has a few issues with a couple of fingers because there is nerve damage, but other than that he is okay."
A 37-year-old man has been charged with wounding with intent to injure in relation to the stabbing.
Soper said he had not yet talked to police about last night's attack.
