New Jersey Police are on the look-out for a man who allegedly committed three separate “knockout game” punches within a 15-minute time frame. The victims sustained bruised jaws and bloody faces. The assailant was described by police as a six-foot or taller black man with an athletic build wearing a Brooklyn Nets hat.
The so-called game is actually a dangerous and sometimes fatal sucker punching of unsuspecting people by violent perpetrators with the intent to render the victims unconscious. The “knockout game” has flourished over the last year and is predominantly carried out by African American teens against whites, Asians, and frequently members of the Jewish community.
According to The Record, a 54-year-old man in a supermarket parking lot was blindsided with a punch to the face, knocking him to the pavement and causing a laceration to his face. Approximately ten minutes after the assault, the same alleged perpetrator attacked a 57-year-old man from behind, punching him on the right side of his face and jaw.
Apparently not having satiated his thirst for hurting unsuspecting people, three minutes later the alleged perp approached a 27-year-old man, asked for directions, and then punched the man in the face when he looked at his phone, the Record noted. Police Capt. Thomas Salcedo expressed his disgust with the assailant’s actions: “Someone just walks up and cold-cocks someone in the face totally unannounced, totally unprovoked.”
An Englewood New Jersey assemblyman, Gordon Johnson, plans to crack down on the violent “knockout game” by sponsoring a proposed law which would institute larger punishments for knock-out game attackers, allowing sentences of up to 10 years in prison. “I thought it best to get ahead of the trend,” Johnson told the Record. “I’m not going to wait for a pattern in New Jersey. It’s definitely a trend in the tri-state area. It is a problem that has to be addressed properly.”