By Demian Bulwa
The San Francisco Chronicle
SAN FRANCISCO — The chief suspect in the March 31 beating of Bryan Stow at Dodger Stadium accosted three other Giants fans before blindsiding Stow with a punch that knocked him unconscious and caused him to slam his head against the ground, Los Angeles prosecutors said Monday.
Deputy District Attorney Michele Hanisee said the attack on Stow was part of an Opening Day assault spree by Dodger fan Louie Sanchez, 29, and argued that Sanchez should remain jailed on $500,000 bail. Sanchez plans to ask for a bail reduction Aug. 10.
Sanchez and 30-year-old Marvin Norwood, who are friends and neighbors in Rialto San Bernardino County, are charged with mayhem, assault and battery in the attack on Stow, who remains hospitalized with a traumatic brain injury.
Doctors believe the 42-year-old paramedic from Santa Cruz suffered the injury, along with a fractured skull, when he hit the pavement.
Sanchez is “completely incapable of controlling his behavior,” Hanisee said in a motion arguing against reduced bail. She said Stow’s injury was not “an isolated act of violence by Sanchez but was the culmination of a chain of violent acts against strangers.”
Sanchez’s attorney, Gilbert Quiñones, did not return a call seeking comment Monday but has said in the past that Sanchez is innocent. Norwood’s lawyer, Marc Lewinstein of the Los Angeles County alternate defender’s office, declined to comment.
According to Hanisee, Sanchez began making trouble inside the stadium, where the Giants were playing their first game since winning the World Series. Sanchez allegedly threw a soda on a fan named Kathryn Gillespie, then tried to attack Gillespie’s male companion - who had yelled at him - before Norwood held him back.
Out in the parking lot, the prosecutor said, Sanchez ran over to a group of Giants fans and “swung his fist at one of them,” then turned his attention to Stow and his friends as they walked in Giants apparel past a car that belonged to Sanchez’s sister.
Sanchez first shoved Stow and punched a friend of his named Matthew Lee, Hanisee said. Lee, a Bay Area resident and a key witness in the case, died Sunday, apparently after suffering an allergic reaction from eating nuts, Los Angeles police said.
After the initial contact with Stow’s group, Hanisee said, Sanchez and Norwood followed the men as they walked several hundred feet toward a taxi stand.
There, Sanchez allegedly punched Allen Bradford, another friend of Stow’s, knocking him to the ground. At this point Stow was facing Norwood, Hanisee said, as Sanchez ran up behind him and punched him in the side of the head.
“Stow’s friends, who are paramedics, describe that Stow immediately lost consciousness and fell sideways to the ground without breaking his fall,” Hanisee said. “When Stow’s head hit the ground, witnesses heard his head impact the concrete and saw it bounce.”
Sanchez then kicked the unconscious Stow several times in the head, the prosecutor said. She said Norwood also kicked Stow, whose friends tried to shield him with their bodies.
Norwood “stood over Stow’s prone body and said, ‘Who else wants to fight?’ ” Hanisee said.
Hanisee also pointed to Sanchez’s criminal history, saying it began with an arrest for resisting a police officer when he was one day shy of his 17th birthday. Within the next year, he was arrested on suspicion of negligently firing a gun and possessing marijuana, she said.
As an adult, Hanisee said, Sanchez has a convictions related to domestic violence, gun possession and drunken driving.
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