A 35-year-old man was arrested on Wednesday, Feb. 6 after becoming violent after a Santa Monica Ralph’s checkout employee asked him for ID when trying to buy beer.
At 3:28 pm officers of the Santa Monica Police Department went to the Ralph’s parking lot at 1644 Cloverfield Boulevard after they received a report of an assault that had just occurred.
When the officers arrived they saw the described suspect at the corner of 19th Street and Olympic Boulevard.
This man was detained while other officers spoke with the victim, in this instance an employee of the store.
The female victim told the officers that she was a checkout person Ralph’s, and that the suspect had approached her checkout station in order to purchase some beer.
The victim said that she had asked for some identification, and the suspect responded to this reasonable request in an entirely unreasonable manner, namely he became very angry.
The suspect then hit his hand in the pack of beers and this caused the beers to fall to the floor, striking the victim.
The checkout person, however, generously told the officers that she did not desire that this man be charged with a crime as a result of his behavior towards her.
The officers then turned their attention towards the suspect, and noticed that he was rather intoxicated and unable to care for himself as a result.
The officers began to take him into custody, but this man pulled away, spun around, and attempted to kick the officers.
The suspect continued in his efforts to kick the officers until he was handcuffed and placed into the back of a police vehicle.
The suspect was then taken to a local hospital to be treated for a facial injury that he had sustained as a result of his behavior towards the police.
A physician cleared him for booking shortly afterwards and this homeless man was arrested and charged with resisting officers, and public intoxication. Bail was set at $10,000.
Editor’s Note: These reports are part of a regular police coverage series entitled “Alert Police Blotter” (APB), which injects some minor editorial into certain police activities in Santa Monica. Not all of the Mirror’s coverage of incidents involving police are portrayed in this manner. More serious crimes and police-related activities are regularly reported without editorial in the pages of the Santa Monica Mirror and its website, smmirror.com.
