A seemingly fit and muscular Massachusetts senior is charged with attempting to drown a slight, physically disabled 21-year-old during a violent clash over noise from the young man’s jet ski at a lake boat ramp in an attack caught on camera.
Bystanders had to pull Steven Dana, 70, off the young jet skier as he held him down on his back underwater near the shoreline, as seen on the viral video posted on social media.
Authorities have accused Dana of attempted murder, strangulation, and assault and battery on a disabled person for the alleged attack on Matthew Duffy at Lake Maspenock’s Sandy Beach in Hopkinton, located about 35 miles southwest of Boston.
The video captured the entire confrontation.
Duffy and his friends were apparently at the boat ramp with their jet ski when local resident Dana loomed above them on an embankment above the shoreline, apparently agitated by the noise.
He attempted to kick the group out of the water, according to a police report reviewed by WCVB.
Duffy was still reportedly getting around with crutches after he suffered a broken leg and other severe injuries from a motorcycle accident in March, according to a New York Post report and social media posts.
A GoPro of one of the victim’s friends was used to record what happened when Dana became increasingly upset as Duffy insisted he was doing nothing wrong and refused to be bullied.
“Let me have fun with my jet ski,” Duffy told Dana, who demanded he take the craft to another part of the lake where the young man said he lived.
Eventually, the large senior, considerably bigger than the 21-year old, stomped down the embankment.
“Are you going to beat up a cripple?” one of Duffy’s friend chimed in.
“I don’t care,” Dana said. “I’ll take a cripple.”
Dana got inches from the young man’s face.
“C’mon big boy,” Dana taunted. “C’mon, big boy. Move that big mouth of yours.”
Dana suddenly slapped Duffy hard in the face and then took him to the ground as the camera loses its angle. The video appears to break for a moment.
When it resumes Dana is on top of Duffy, who is lying flat, submerged in the water, with Dana apparently pinning him down with his hands around his neck as one of Duffy’s friends flees on the jet ski.
Moments later, three adults come to Duffy’s aid, yelling, “Hold on. Hold on right now.”
They wrestle the aggressive senior off the young man.
The badly shaken Duffy limped onto the shore, favoring his injured leg, vowing to sue.
“I was so scared for my life because I can’t fight back, I broke practically everything and this guy’s on top of me under the water, I can’t see what’s going on, I can’t fight back,” Duffy told WCVB.
Dana was held on Thursday after his arraignment on charges but a judge released him Friday on $7,500 cash bond.
He pleaded not guilty and had no comment as he was pursued by reporters after the proceeding.
“Prosecutors said Dana has an extensive criminal history going back to the 1990s where he used aliases,” according to ABC affiliate WCVB5.
Contributor Lowell Cauffiel is the best-selling author of the Los Angeles crime novel Below the Line and nine other crime novels and nonfiction titles. See lowellcauffiel.com for more.
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