Family Furious After Boy, 4, Is Hit By Thrown Brick On Staten Island
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A man was facing charges Tuesday night for allegedly throwing a brick into a crowd and hitting a 4-year-old boy on Staten Island.
As CBS2's Tony Aiello reported, the victim's family was furious.
"It hurts," said the boy, Josiah Morton.
The knot on Josiah's head is the size of a small egg. It took 11 stitches to close the wound, and the cut was too graphic to show uncensored on television.
Josiah's father, Antoine Morton, could not believe someone would throw a brick in the direction of a child.
"There was a group of kids there," Morton said. "And for you to throw a rock when there's a group of kids, you're intending to hurt somebody."
It happened Monday in the New Brighton section of Staten Island. Josiah's brother, Jerome Cameron, said he and others approached a man who allowed his dog to run unleashed in the neighborhood.
The man ran to a vacant lot and grabbed a broken brick about the size of a fist, witnesses said.
"He just threw one at us," Cameron said. "He launched it at the crowd and it hit my brother."
Tanisha Green said she was shocked when she saw the injury to her little boy.
"I was going crazy," Green said. "I couldn't believe it, that a grown man would take a rock and throw it into a crowd of kids."
Police said the suspect got roughed up a bit by the angry crowd that gathered.
The criminal complaint against Marcillio Perez, 30, lists charges including assault, endangering the welfare of a child, and criminal possession of a weapon.
Josiah was recovering Tuesday night, but may need plastic surgery down the road.