Victim suffers non-life-threatening injuries
LOWELL >> Two 25-ounce cans of “Natty Daddy” beer, dented and oozing their frothy contents, came to a rest several feet apart along Mammoth Road on Friday after the man who had just purchased the beverages was hit by a vehicle.
Reports of a man down in the road, unconscious but breathing, came in an emergency radio broadcast shortly after 5 p.m. Moments after the initial report, a Lowell police officer was on scene, informing dispatch that the man had a laceration to his head and possibly a broken nose.
The officer added the man had a pulse, “but he isn’t doing too good.”
A witness, who wished to remain anonymous, said the injured man had just left Rex Bottled Liquors, located at 68 Mammoth Road, after making a purchase. He noted the man, who he estimated was over the age of 60, is a regular at the locale and was on his way home at the time of the impact.
The witness said he did not see the crash, but he heard “a big thump.” When he looked for the source of the sound, he saw the man lying motionless along the roadway.
The driver involved in the crash then exited her vehicle in a panic.
“The driver gets out and she starts screaming hysterically,” the witness said. “She kept saying, ‘He came out of nowhere.’”
The witness pointed out that the man was wearing a dark trench coat, which he acknowledged would be difficult to see considering the sun had set.
Medical personnel placed the man onto a gurney and loaded him into an ambulance. Emergency crews on scene said he suffered nonlife-threatening injuries.
“They said he was breathing and he’d be OK,” the witness said, “but when I was out here looking at him, he was unresponsive.”
The Lowell Police Department’s Accident Reconstruction Unit responded to the scene. Police tape surrounded the crash scene, which included the vehicle involved that had come to a rest pointed inbound on Mammoth Road.
A man is accused of using an umbrella to assault his neighbor and the neighbor’s dog after the umbrella-wielding assailant took exception to the four-legged friend barking at him outside their apartment building.
John Caron, 69, of Belvidere Heights in Lowell, is charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, with the dangerous weapon identified by police as the umbrella. Caron is additionally charged with assault and battery on a person over the age of 60.
Based on the alleged victim’s account to police, he and his dog, and two other residents, were outside the Belvidere Heights apartment building, located at 117 High St., on Dec. 3, when Caron walked out of the building. A Lowell Police report states the alleged victim — a 68-yearold man — said his dog proceeded to bark a couple times at Caron. He claimed that Caron then smacked the dog with the umbrella, and then kicked the pet in the stomach.
The police report states when the alleged victim told Caron to leave his dog alone, Caron yelled out, “I don’t like you and your dog.”
According to the police report, the 68-year-old man claimed he attempted to lead his dog away from Caron, but Caron tried to stab him with the umbrella and then “punched him with a closed fist in the face.” The alleged assault continued when Caron “thrusted the point end of the umbrella into the left side of (the alleged victim’s) stomach.”
According to the report, a scrum ensued between the pair. The 68-year-old man
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