By Cathy Kelly
Contra Costa Times
LOS ANGELES — A 42-year-old Santa Cruz man is in critical condition at a Los Angeles area hospital today after being beaten and kicked by two men wearing Dodger’s attire in the parking lot of Dodger Stadium Thursday night, Los Angeles police said.
Bryan Stow went to the opening game with three friends, at least some of whom work with him at American Medical Response in San Mateo, said his brother-in-law, David Collins of Scotts Valley.
Stow, a Giants fan, is a father of two who works as a paramedic, Collins said. He was attending the game with friends from Berkeley and Discovery Bay, both of whom are in their 20s. They too were injured, and were treated and released.
“He’s not doing too well,” Collins said of Stow. “He’s still unconscious and they just decided to put him in a medically induced coma. They are hoping the brain swelling will go down, but it hasn’t and they are talking about removing one of his frontal lobes.”
Collins said he spoke with one of Stow’s friends who told him four friends in all were wearing Giants attire and being heckled by several people as they left the game. They ignored the hecklers, he said, and then two men “came out of nowhere” and struck Stow in the back of the head.
He fell and struck his head on the pavement and the men continued to attack him, kicking and hitting him, Collins said.
His friends tried to intervene, but it was crowded and they had trouble reaching him, he said. During the melee, the assailants ran off, he said.
“Bryan is the biggest, that is probably why they jumped on him first,” he said. “The gentleman I talked to was still shook-up. Both guys pushed Bryan down, so he didn’t even see them coming.”
Los Angeles police Sgt. Sanford Rosenberg said the suspects were described as Latino men in their late teens or early 20s. And though the San Francisco Giants and Los Angeles Dodgers rivalry is well-known and long-standing, Rosenberg said this attack goes way beyond acceptable fan behavior.
“We can sit and talk for hours about fan mentality,” he said. “It’s fun to talk about my team is better than your team, but when you cross the line like this, there’s no excuse. I’m ashamed to see this.”
Los Angeles detective P.J. Morris said investigators reviewed surveillance tape, but couldn’t make out the suspects among the thousands of people in the parking lot.
“But we do have several leads we’re looking at,” he said. “We’re going to stay on this as long as we have to get it resolved. I hate for this to happen. People come down to our city to enjoy a game and something like this happens. It’s not right.”
Morris said there is an area gang that favors Dodgers caps and that the caps have become a gang symbol for them.
“We’ve seen a lot of gang members wearing it, but I don’t know if that’s related,” he said.
Collins said he hopes someone will come forward who saw the attack or captured it on a cell phone camera or something.
He said Stow’s parents, Ann and Dave Stow of Capitola, are active at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church and that Ann Stow works at St. John’s Catholic Church in Felton. Those communities and his family and friends are praying for him, Collins said.
“We’re all pretty shocked,” Collins said. “We’re all praying for him.”
Several family members flew to Los Angeles today to be with Stow, he said.
Rosenberg, the LAPD sergeant, said a man was killed in the stadium a few years ago, due to baseball team rivalry. A stabbing there in 2009 was unrelated to baseball, he said.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Marc Antenorcruz of West Covina was walking out of the stadium after a game in 2003 when he got into an argument with a group of men and was shot. Pete Marron was convicted of the shooting, the newspaper reported.
Morris asked that anyone with information on the attack call him at (213) 847-4261.
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