LA Times Reporter Covering Comic-Con Beat Up in the Gaslamp Quarter

The Gaslamp Quarter was swarmed by Comic-Con attendees last week dressed up as superheroes and other creative costumes. For the first time in its history, Comic-Con tickets were sold out Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Unfortunately for Geoff Boucher, a writer for the Los Angeles Times, this Comic-Con will be memorable because of the stitches he needed after getting beat up late Saturday night.

I (literally) bumped into a young guy walking with three friends in the Gaslamp Quarter. They were tattooed and wearing the street uniform of baggy pants, white T-shirts and shaved heads. The guy started mad-dogging me, rasping threats. I told him I was just walking by, no offense meant. He got in my face, and I told him it would be stupid for us to make something out of nothing.

“You calling me stupid?” “No, I’m not.” Then I stopped talking, because my mouth was bleeding. One of his buddies, standing off to my side, cold-cocked me, and the ring on his fist took a chunk out of my face. I never saw it coming. I was at the emergency room until dawn.

Hopefully Geoff Boucher and other Comic-Con goers are not discouraged from attending Comic-Con by this isolated event. Maybe the gang of three was among the 8,000 fans still hyped up from Friday nights screening of 300 on the jumbotron at Petco Park.

Having grown up in San Diego, downtown was never a place to feel safe in, but things are far better now than 25 years ago before the new Trolley, Horton Plaza, and the Convention Center were all built. Back then you might venture downtown to Seaport Village, or Kobey’s swap meet on Broadway but your average consumer rarely went downtown.

The Gaslamp Quarter will always have its share of urban crime, but this should serve as a reminder that we should not walk alone late at night in downtown. In almost every violent incident I ever heard about the victim was walking alone in downtown.