Detroit – A 22-year-old man repeatedly punched a 91-year-old man in the head during a carjacking, and a group of bystanders did nothing to stop him, police said.
Store surveillance video shows each blow Leonard Sims took in last week’s attack. The footage also shows a group of people a few feet away who either didn’t see the attack or chose not to get involved.
“You can’t really tell what they were focusing on,” Maria Miller, a spokeswoman for the Wayne County prosecutor’s office, said Monday.
At least one witness reported the attack, Miller said.
Sims was treated at a hospital and released.
He was outside his car in a store parking lot about 8:30 p.m. when a man walked up and asked for a light for his cigarette, according to prosecutors.
The man then punched Sims at least a half-dozen times while Sims held onto the car door. The video shows the man using the door to knock Sims to the ground before taking the keys and driving off in the 2005 Chevy Malibu.
Police arrested the suspected attacker Thursday after a foot chase in Warren, just north of Detroit.
A bruised Sims told a TV station that the assailant was of “very low character.”
“If he wanted the car,” Sims said, “he could have grabbed the keys and taken off.”
