A Long Island man has been arrested and charged after he was caught on video assaulting a 15-year-old who he accused of taking his baseball, CBS News reported.
Andrew Chiaro, 36, was charged with misdemeanor assault and endangering the welfare of a child.
The victim, Trent Rounsvall, told CBS News that the May 21 incident began when he was with his friends at a local skatepark which is right next to a baseball field.
“A ball got hit into the park, almost hit me in the head, landed pretty much right in front of me, so I picked it up, put it in my pocket,” the teen said, adding that adult men immediately came over from the field and started cursing at him.
The video shows Chiaro lunge for the teen and grapple with him before slamming him into the fence.
“He’s a f***ing minor!” one onlooker can be herd yelling.
“I was just thinking, no way this is actually happening right now, that someone who I can tell is a lot older than me was putting his hands on me,” the teen said.
“There was no ‘Hey, kid, can I have the ball back’ … he was attacked, the whole group of kids were intimidated,” the boy’s mother Terry Lipton tearfully told ABC7.
“You’re not hurt that bad, you are the same size as him, you know if we charge him with harassment, you’ll just get slapped with robbery and you’ll both be in cuffs,” she says the police told her.
Watch a report on the story below:
