Police are seeking help finding a man who allegedly hit a Santa Ana restaurant manager on the head with a beer bottle during a fight on Super Bowl Sunday.
A man who allegedly attacked a Santa Ana restaurant manager on Super Bowl Sunday is shown in surveillance video released by police on Feb. 13, 2020.
The incident was reported about 8:45 p.m. Feb. 2 when a fight broke out in the parking lot of Spoons Bar and Grill, located at 2601 Hotel Terrace.
The restaurant manager tried to stop the fight, when a man ran out of the restaurant and “struck the victim with a beer bottle to the head,” Santa Ana police said in a news release.
The man got into a dark-colored Jeep Cherokee which drove away from the scene.
He is described as being about 5 feet 6, and weighs about 210 pounds. He was seen wearing a gray sweatshirt with a Chargers logo on the front and jeans, police said.
Video released by police on Thursday shows the assailant talking to a group of people inside the restaurant before he runs outside. Once in the parking lot, the man runs toward where the altercation was apparently taking place and the video shows him taking a swing at the victim before that person falls to the floor.
Another camera angle shows the assailant getting into the passenger seat of the Jeep.
It is unclear what led to the attack, but investigators speculate that the assailant knew one or more people involved in the original fight and thought he was defending his friend or friends, Detective Corporal Paul McClaskey told KTLA.
The victim was taken to a hospital with lacerations to his head. Investigators do not believe the two men knew each other.
“There’s a large group of people that saw this altercation, there’s a group of people, you can see in the video, that are with the suspect," Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said. “Our hope is that somebody realizes that this was just the manager trying to keep peace at his business and he becomes a victim."
Anyone with information about the incident, or can identify the assailant, can call McClaskey at 714-245-8309.