Skateboarder Assaults Philly Park Ranger Who Told Him He Couldn't Skateboard in Park

Skaters fled

REGULAR skaters at LOVE Park say they have a subtle truce with the rangers, a cat-and-mouse game of grinding along concrete steps when they're gone and leaving peacefully with wheels up when they show up.

The skaters were OK with that, too, but now they fear that some "suburban kid who always acts hard" has ruined it for all of them by punching, kicking and spitting on a ranger who tried to get him and some other skaters to leave Friday afternoon.

Comments

[Ranter]

GET THESE POOR RANGERS AN APC, BODY ARMOR AND SOME ASSAULT RIFLES...

[David K]

Why do reporters insist on calling these "assaults". It was a battery, which may or may not have had an assault preceding it.

[Redbeard]

Because they are using the common definition, not the legal one. Go look in a regular dictionary, not a legal one, and "a violent physical attack" will alomst definitely be listed as the primary definition, not "an intentional act by one person that creates an apprehension in another of an imminent harmful or offensive contact."

[David K]

OK, thanks.

I do wish English was more precise.

[GILMORE]

SEE! MILLENIALS ARE LIBERTARIAN!!

[crufus]

The skateboarders vs. park rangers thing has been going on for many years, but never with violence before now.

The given reason for the no skateboarding rule is that skateboards damage the park, but I suspect that the real reason is that the skateboarders irritate tourists and office workers.

[crufus]

Suspect arrested in LOVE Park assault
http://www.philly.com/philly/n.....sault.html
"...The man was arrested at his mother's home in Pottstown Monday morning and was on the way to a Philadelphia police station, the source said. He is expected to face charges of aggravated assault, simple assault and reckless endangerment of another person..."