Two men accused of a brutal attack at the Dodgers stadium parking lot following a 2022 Elton John concert have been acquitted of battery and vandalism charges after a four-week jury trial.
A jury on Thursday found Chad Reeves, 44, and Reese Hopkin, 40, not guilty of battery causing serious injury to Jaime and Lillian Grenfell, a married couple in their 60s. Hopkin was also found not guilty of vandalism related to a bystander’s cell phone that was broken during the incident.
The pair were charged in 2023 after a video of the Nov. 17, 2022 incident went viral.
Prosecutors alleged that Hopkin and Reeves attacked the couple after a side mirror on the couple’s Chevy Tahoe struck Reeves as they were driving away from the first of three sold-out performances.
Jaime Grenfell suffered serious injuries and was knocked unconscious by Hopkin. Prosecutors also alleged Hopkin grabbed the phone of a man recording the incident and threw it to the ground.
At trial, defense lawyers said the video showed only a portion of the incident. Reeves’ attorney, Glen Jonas, argued the viral video was “edited,” and claimed that Jaime Grenfell “attacked’’ Reeves and a woman, but it was not shown in the video.
They argued that Reeves came to the defense of Jessica Santi, after Grenfell initiated an altercation with her. In their narrative, the Grenfells’ SUV mirror struck Reeves and it led to yelling, and then Jaime Grenfell got out of the SUV and came toward Santi and struck Reeves first, according to court records.
As to Hopkin, the attorneys argued that he only became involved in the conflict when his wife, Lindsay Hopkin, was allegedly assaulted.
Jonas said the evidence he and attorneys Raffi Manuelian and Dilan Patel presented showed Hopkin knocked out Jaime Grenfell with a punch to the face when the alleged victim tried to reengage in the conflict, Jonas said.
“These two innocent men — Mr. Reeves and Mr. Hopkin — were falsely prosecuted by a District Attorney’s Office that refused to look at the case objectively,” Jonas said, blaming former Dist. Atty. George Gascón for the charges.
“The bigger picture is that regular people can manipulate the entire public and the media into a pitchfork mob mentality against innocent people and the district attorney’s office goes along with it,” Jonas said.
Manuelian, who represented Hopkin, told City News Service after the verdict it was a vindication for a family man. “It’s all about context,” he said. “Let’s not judge people based on what we see in the social media.”
The Grenfells have sued Reeves, Hopkin and the Dodgers over the incident, alleging there was inadequate security that night — something the Dodgers deny. In the lawsuit, Jaime Grenfell alleges that he and his wife “suffered a head injury in the attack and other contusions and wounds and she witnessed her husband’s beating and his resulting injuries.”
This story originally appeared on LA Times
