ANAHEIM, Calif – A Southern California family said they were still shaken up Wednesday after a man clambered on top of their vehicle and tried to punch out the windshield the day before in an apparent case of road rage.
Anaheim police are investigating the incident, which was captured on cellphone video by one of driver Veneranda Alvarez’s daughters.
Alvarez said she had just picked her two daughters, ages 12 and 13, up from school, then drove with them to meet her friend Chris at the Jack in the Box near the corner of State College Boulevard and Lincoln Avenue around 2:30 p.m. Tuesday.
According to Alvarez, the attacker followed Chris over to the fast food eatery’s parking lot from a Walgreens in the same shopping complex for some unknown reason. Chris was on foot, while the man was driving a white Jeep Grand Cherokee, she said.
“Then when (Chris) came near my passenger side, he had told the guy, ‘Stop harassing me, stop following us,'” Alvarez told KTLA.
She said they were too afraid to wait in line for food at the drive-thru, so they drove away.
But then “this car kept on following us, this guy,” Alvarez said. “It’s scary, and he was tailgating me.”
She made a U-turn to try and get away from him, but he came up behind her and cut her off.
“That’s when he got out the car and he jumped on my hood of my car, then he started banging on it twice,” she said. “Then he shattered my windshield.”
The cellphone video shows the attack lasted only about 20 seconds, but still left a considerable amount of damage.
The hood of their Nissan Cube was dented after he climbed on top, and his two punches compromised the entire driver’s side of the windshield.
Luckily, no one inside the car was injured.
“I believe that God was with me,” Alvarez said. “I don’t know what to think. It’s crazy.”
Both her daughters missed school Wednesday because they were still so shaken up by the confrontation, she said.
Police have yet to say whether they are looking for any suspects in the case, but Alvarez said she hopes the man is arrested.
“I want him to get caught and be responsible for his actions,” she said.
