Workplace Prank Leads to Alleged Baseball Bat Beating

Last Friday, at approximately 4:30 p.m., officers Larry Brotherton and Kevin Stewart of the West Precinct were dispatched to the 1400 block of Elliot Avenue West in response to a fight involving two construction coworkers, one tasteless joke, and an aluminum Louisville Slugger.

The police report notes that the trouble began earlier in the day when one of the men, who had been “operating a crane at the work site, a position requiring the utmost attention with no distractions” was naturally distracted by the other man—his coworker—who called up to the crane operator and made “some mention of the name of [someone] who a long time ago spat in [his] face,” despite knowing that it was something he was “very sensitive about.”

Telling his side of the story, the coworker maintained that it was all “in jest,” but the crane operator told police he was “angry at being distracted.”

So angry, in fact, that when the coworker drove home from work, the crane operator followed him, got out of his car at a red light with a “small Louisville Slugger aluminum bat,” and approached his coworker’s car.

However, the light must’ve turned green (or something) before the crane operator could confront the jokester—the police reports that he quickly returned to his car and continued following the coworker, who eventually turned into a parking lot.

Both men parked their cars. The baseball enthusiast once again exited his vehicle, Louisville Slugger in hand. The coworker told police that as the crane operator “menacingly approached,” he did the sensible thing and got out to protect his car from the bat-wielding sourpuss.

“Words were exchanged,” the report states, and although it does not specify what sort of words, they were not words of apology because the crane operator then swung his slugger and allegedly “[struck] the victim in the upper back near the left shoulder, and in the victim’s left thigh.” The victim stated that he tried to block the crane operator from beating him any further, but still sustained injuries to his forearm, and “white marks” on his inner thigh.

Upon arrival, responding officers ordered the suspect to drop the bat, which he did. They then arrested him “without incident” although the report notes that the suspect, evidently unskilled in the art of letting things go, did tell one Officer Norton that “he would settle this one way or the other.” The report helpfully explains that this means “he would settle this after being released.”