Video shows ‘unprovoked’ attack by 80-year-old Redondo Beach Elks Lodge member – Daily Breeze

An 80-year-old man whose beating at the Redondo Beach Elks Lodge was caught on video is suing the lodge and two former members.

Joseph Lordeon of Redondo Beach accused the lodge, former High Ruler Nashana Steele and her husband Lamont Steele of battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, premises liability, negligence and elder abuse in a lawsuit filed last week in Los Angeles Superior Court.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.

Security camera footage of the May 5 encounter, obtained by the Southern California News Group, allegedly shows Lamont Steele searching the cottage for Loerden, wearing a MAGA hat, and then punching him repeatedly in the hall.

“This brutal attack was completely unprovoked,” said former Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley, who is helping Lordeon on the case. “I don’t understand why someone would do something like that to an elderly and frail man. And to think that the perpetrator and his wife were officers of this club. This makes it even more scandalous.”

Neither Nashana Steele, who has resigned as exalted ruler and no longer attends the Redondo Beach lodge, nor Lamont Steele, whom the Elks have permanently exiled, returned calls seeking comment.

Officials with the Chicago-based Order of the Benevolent and Protective Elks declined to discuss the alleged assault because it is a criminal matter.

“The Benevolent and Protective Order of Moose has always considered our lodges to be places where members and their guests can feel comfortable and enjoy social opportunities in a caring and friendly environment,” spokesman Rick Gathen told SCNG in June. “Acts of violence have no place in our lodges and the alleged reports are both disturbing and unacceptable.”

Founded in 1868, BPOE has nearly one million members who gather in 2,000 lodges throughout the United States and abroad. The Elks provide charitable services to build stronger communities, sponsoring college scholarships, youth basketball teams, drug awareness programs, and the like.

The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office has charged Lamont Steele with assault and elder abuse. He is awaiting trial.

Lordeon told the Southern California News Group his experience started around 4:30 p.m. on Cinco de Mayo, when he visited the 70-year-old Elks Lodge on the eastern end of the waterfront Veterans Park to meet friends.

As he was leaving, he said, about 15 minutes later, a lodge member invited him to eat at a private party attended by about 45 people held at another bar on the north end of the lodge.

Lordeon, the real estate agent, received a plate, helped himself to salad from the buffet, and began to walk away. However, the lawsuit states that Nashana Steele blocked Lordeon and ordered him to leave the box because she was upset that he was wearing a Donald Trump hat. The recording shows Lordeon having a heated discussion with Nashana Steele.

Lordeon left the dining room, but not the cottage, and sat on the sofa in the hall to eat his food.

The lawsuit says Nashana Steele sought out Lamont Steele, who was on the cottage’s patio, to throw Lordeon out, describing him to her husband as wearing a Trump hat.

However, the seven-page, heavily redacted Redondo Beach Police report gives a conflicting motive for the attack, stating that someone told Lamont Steele that the man had attacked his wife.

Security camera footage shows Lamont Steele and others allegedly searching the cottage for the man and then finding him in the hall.

Lamont Steele told police he asked the man if he touched his wife, to which the man responded, “Fuck you.” A report obtained by Southern California News Group said this made him even more upset, prompting him to allegedly punch the man with a closed fist.

Lordeon denied touching Nashana Steele.

Lordeon, who suffered a large wound to his face and ribs, said Elks member Karen Shonka, a former Los Angeles County homicide detective who removed pieces of salad from his mouth after the attack to keep him from choking and called 911 for an ambulance. .

A Redondo Beach police officer who viewed video of the incident said in a report that the assault was unprovoked, adding that Lordeon was punched three times, lifted off the couch and pushed to the floor. The attacker then stood over Lordeon, struck him with an open hand, left the cottage and drove home.