A 65-year-old man was confronted by a group of women and beaten up in front of his 7-year-old great grandson at a Victorville, California, gas station Friday afternoon in an incident that was caught on camera, officials said.
The altercation occurred around 1 p.m. at the ARCO gas station on the 12000 block of Hesperia Road. The victim, Danny Froschauer, said the fight was over a gas pump.
Froschauer said the women in another other car started yelling "we was going to go there, get your car out of there" after he had already pulled into the desired pump. Froschauer said he refused and that the women then began approaching his car and yelling.
Froschauer said that one of the women then went inside the gas station and put money on that pump.
"She came back out and said, 'ha, now you can’t do anything, because I put money on that pump and we’re going to use that pump,' and I said 'no you’re not,'" Froschauer said. "I thought she was going to come up to my face and argue some more and I’m just standing there, and she got right close to me, and then sucker punched me."
Froschauer said that he tried to knock away their hits by swinging his arms, but that he did not hit the women.
Froschauer’s great-grandson Dakota said that one woman who was pregnant even threatened him.
Local
Get Los Angeles's latest local news on crime, entertainment, weather, schools, COVID, cost of living and more. Here's your go-to source for today's LA news.
'I said leave my grandpa alone," Dakota said. "She said, 'shut up little kid, I don’t care if you’re little or not, I will still push you.'"
Dakota said that he threatened to call police, but that the women then tried to knock his phone from his hand.
"I didn’t know like really what to do," Dakota said. "I was kind of scared."
According to Froschauer, one of the women confronted a witness who was recording the incident on his cell phone and tried to take the device from him. One of the women allegedly stole a cellphone during the confrontation, officials said.
Froschauer credits the gas station owner for breaking up the fight. Shortly thereafter, law enforcement arrived on scene.
"I feel real lucky, as violent as they was, I, you know, I’ve seen women on TV fighting and they kind of smack at each other, but those three punch like a guy," Froschauer said. "I think that they deserve jail time, because if it’s not me, they’re going to get somebody else…because for no more confrontation than what we had, of the arguing that we had, for them to get violent like they did, they’re going to do it somebody else."
San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Sgt. Ken Lutz confirmed Friday night that the women in the video had been detained and that the incident was under investigation.
Authorities said Saturday that two women were arrested on suspicion of strong arm robbery and taken to jail. A third woman was not arrested because she is pregnant, but officials said she would be charged at a later time.
Dakota has his own advice for the women involved in this incident.
"Don’t be so violent over like a gas pump. It’s really just a gas pump and there’s other places you could have gone or waited for," the great-grandson said. "Because we didn’t pretty much didn’t see you pulling and we got there first and you didn’t have to be violent."
