In the middle of Los Angeles, 10 teens on bikes surrounded a man in his white pickup truck and beat him like a punching bag.
“They were yelling at him, and it didn’t look like they were going to stop,” said Gary, who saw what happened.
Gary, who didn’t want to give out his last name, recorded the violent attack from the 13th floor of his building.
“I came to the window because I heard the truck getting hit and people yelling,” he said.
Gary’s video starts on Hill Street, just as one of the teens throws a bike at a truck, breaking the driver’s windshield. It’s still not clear what started the fight. At the same time, the rest of the group jumps the driver and starts kicking him over and over as the driver tries to defend himself.
After the driver got up and ran back to his truck, the beating stopped for a moment. However, the teens weren’t done. One of them opens the driver’s side door with a lot of force and keeps punching the man. The victim got away from the beating by driving away from the chaos.
People who saw it said the man’s face was covered in blood. People who work in the area said that this kind of violent attack is nothing new downtown.
“Honestly, I thought it was theft,” said a witness named Lauren Morinello. “I thought someone was getting robbed, since that happens a lot around here.”
Even though cops and security guards walk around the area, Morinello wants there to be more people there. When the police got there, everyone had already left.
Some people feel like their safety is always at risk if nothing is done.
“We don’t want to work in these conditions, but we have to,” said Gary. “It’s a little stressful because we feel like it could happen to any of us at any time.”