An attack in Santa Cruz

This vehicular assault report was posted last Friday to a Facebook group for issues in the city of Santa Cruz, California.

Santa Cruz attack vs cyclist

The driver was in a 90s dark blue Mercedes. The attack took place on Broadway at Ocean, which has heavy traffic from all directions, including plenty of bike traffic. Anyone who can’t handle the presence of somebody on a bike in this part of Santa Cruz doesn’t belong on the road at all.

The person who saw this reported this to Santa Cruz police but was unable to get a good license plate number. She owns Pacific Avenue Cycles located kind of near the wharf, so kudos to her.

Almost all of the followup comments are sympathetic to the cyclist, including one from somebody who works at a shop that services old Mercedes and offered to keep an eye out for the vehicle.

There is one guy who persists in demonizing the victim because “entitled” cyclists “impede” him when he needs to run to the store with absolutely no delay. You have heard the story, no doubt. Several people have suggested this guy needs to relax and have pointed out that delays are a normal part of traffic, but he just doubles down on his ignorance. I don’t have time for idiots so I’ve removed myself from that conversation.

The conversation is in a closed group for Santa Cruz residents, but here’s the link if you think you want to take a look.

H/T to Sandrine for the heads up.

3 Comments

  1. The admonishment “please be careful out there” seems unfair to the cyclist. What does that even mean?

  2. Thank you for sharing about this terrible assault (or attempted murder as BikeScoot rightfully pointed out).
    There are no excuses for running a person over with their bicycle on them but to top it all this happened on a quite busy bike lane indeed.
    I don’t believe there are any updates accessible right now… I would really like to know how the victim is doing and if something has been or can be done.

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