Two people were injured in a mass brawl at a cafe caused by a woman’s assault, Ohio police said. Authorities are still looking for the man accused of assaulting the woman.
The Logan County Sheriff’s Office responded to several 911 calls about ongoing fighting at a bar in Lakeview, Ohio, on July 3, authorities said in an incident report. Callers reported that one person had been “beaten by a mob” and suffered serious injuries, including “what was described as his eye drooping”.
A 26-year-old woman from Urbana, Ohio, told authorities she was “romantically chased” by another male bar patron all night, according to the incident report. She said the man persisted even after telling him she was not interested and that she “believes she said something that may have offended the man”.
In response, he pushed her to the ground, the incident report said.
The woman told authorities she is fighting back in self-defense, only for the man to hit her again, according to the report.
Other bar-goers became involved and the fight escalated as people tried to defend the woman and end the fight, authorities said in their report.
The woman was left with “visible redness around her face, a small lump over her right eye and her legs and feet were covered in scrapes, scrapes and gravel dust in the parking lot,” the incident report said.
Around the same time, another fight started outside the bar, according to the report. A man — who had been kicked out of the bar three times that night — shouted a racist statement, a witness reported to authorities.
A “crowd of bar patrons” began beating a 25-year-old man from Lima, Ohio, authorities said. According to the report, officers did not know if this man was the same man who had been evicted multiple times.
The attacked man was taken in a purple car and drove away, the incident report said. Shortly after, a nearby sheriff’s deputy identified the car and stopped it.
The driver tried to flee on foot, but a sheriff’s deputy knocked the man to the ground. Still, he resisted, trying to hide a plastic bag of Xanax under a nearby fence, authorities said in the report.
When he looked into the passenger seat of the car, the deputy saw a shirtless man in a bloodstained swimming trunks. “His eye was severely swollen and protruding,” the report said.
The man was taken by helicopter to a nearby hospital, officers said. No further updates have been released.
When officers arrived at the bar, employees had broken up the fights and the man accused of assaulting the woman had fled, witnesses said.
The female victim told authorities she plans to press charges, and authorities said they would issue arrest warrants for the man accused of assault.
Lakeview is located about 70 miles northwest of Columbus.
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