Editor’s note: Video contains graphic violence and language that may be unsuitable for some.
(Corine Gatti, Headline USA) A group of up to 40 teenagers mercilessly attacked three off-duty Marines at a California beach late Friday night, the New York Post reported.
Hunter Antonino, one of the attacked servicemen, said he and his friends had time off from Camp Pendleton, a Marine Corps training base in Oceanside, when a rowdy crowd set off fireworks and were becoming unruly.
“They were lighting off fireworks, they were being belligerent and obnoxious and annoying other people, so I went up to them and told them to stop,” Antonino told KCAL.
“We told them we were Marines so they should leave—but they didn’t,” he continued. “They just kept going at it.”
What started as a request for the teens to stop lighting fireworks soon turned into a nightmare for the servicemen. The situation escalated from a fun night out to an all-out brawl—all caught on video.
The now-viral footage, which first spread via the Nextdoor platform, showed the Marines being followed like a pack of wolves by the teens as they walked toward the San Clemente Pier Bowl.
As the group of servicemen began to ascend the stairs, a voice from the back shouted for them to “get the f**k outta here”—-before a person sucker-punched the trailing serviceman.
Within seconds the group circled around the two Marines and yelled “Get that f***er'” and “f*** that f***er up.”
The video showed two victims, who appeared curled up in the fetal position on the ground while a crowd kicked and assaulted them. While only two victims were shown in the footage, a third Marine was also attacked but is not featured in the video.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Department said on social media that two men sustained minor injuries in the accident.
One of them had an injury to the hand, while both of them had scraped knees. Additionally, they both complained of soreness in the abdomen, chest and head, the Daily Mail reported.
The victims refused medical treatment, and all “individuals responsible are identified and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Orange County Sheriff’s deputies said.
No arrests were made.