US

Conservative filmmaker: Trayvon Martin protesters in Oakland ‘slugged me,’ ‘kicked me’ in the head

Font Size:

Christian Hartsock, a conservative journalist and filmmaker, says he was assaulted and beaten down to the ground by a mob with repeated strikes to the face while reporting at a Trayvon Martin rally in downtown Oakland Sunday night.

“I have interviews and I have footage of [Trayvon protestors] chanting ‘no justice, no peace—fuck you pigs in your sleep,’” Hartsock told The Daily Caller. “One of them was an elementary schooler chanting with his mom.”

Hartsock says he arrived at 9:30 PM to film the rally.

But soon after, he was repeatedly told by two men to leave the public area. When he refused, they became belligerent, Hartsock told TheDC.

“After retreating to a corner to catch B-roll, two young men approached me and interrogated me as to what I was doing there,” recalls Hartsock. “I advised them I was just there to see what was going on. They told me to get out. I asked why, which only afforded more threats. I declined their request to leave, they continued marching.”

APTOPIX Neighborhood Watch California Protests.JPEG

A flag burns during a protest after George Zimmerman was found not guilty in the 2012 shooting death of teenager Trayvon Martin, early Sunday, July 14, 2013, in Oakland, Calif. Protesters angered by the acquittal Zimmerman held largely peaceful demonstrations in three California cities, but broke windows and started small street fires in Oakland, police said. (AP Photo/Bay Area News Group, Anda Chu)

Hartsock continued, “The two young men came back up to me and told me to leave. I told them ‘no’ and asked them what their issue was. Then other ralliers, noticing the two young men’s belligerence toward me, assumed I must have been up to something, so they began to approach me too and ask me what my problem was. I explained that I didn’t have a problem and didn’t know why I was being suddenly questioned. Within seconds there was an entire circle around me, threats being leveled from every direction.”

“One young man chanted ‘There’s gonna be some violence tonight!’” Hartsock said. “He then came up to me and demanded I erase the footage from my phone — another request I declined.”

“As two other young men interrogated me, their friend behind them came up and a young man then slugged me in the face about three times — hard — and demanded that I leave,” Hartsock said. “Then I began getting clocked by others in my left temple and jaw by other assailants and was mowed to the ground by about half a dozen of them.”

Hartsock feared the worst. “For a couple minutes I was pinned down to the ground — one gentleman on top of me slugging me across the face repeatedly as an indeterminable number of others kicked me in the side of the head, and tried to get my phone out of my hand… The harder my grip tightened, the harder their punches to my face became,” he said.

Christian Hartsock

(Photo courtesy Christian Hartsock)

Hartsock “[e]ventually fought them off before they could get my camera, wallet and keys.” Hartsock, who has filed a police report, was surprised that neither the media, nor the police seemed to be attentive. “My video didn’t capture the assault but the mob was trying to jack my camera and my wallet and keys.”

An ABC News van, parked within view of the incident, failed to record the assault, Hartsock said.

“ABC news van less than 20 feet away, got NONE of it. Yeah, this is why we have to do you guys’ jobs for you and get paid in blood,” wrote Hartsock on Facebook. “My face is swollen and I have a huge black eye.”

“I fought them off somehow—it was kind of miraculous,” Hartsock said.

When he asked why the TV news crew got none of it on camera, they responded by recording Hartsock talking to a police officer. ABC Channel 7 News aired that footage and Hartsock’s allegations on Sunday night’s newscast.

WATCH:

Hartsock says he doesn’t see a racial angle at play in his assault. “Some of my assailants were white. Some black, some mixed race. There were civilized people there who were black and very kind to me at first.”

“I had no problems with anyone until two thugs came up to me and gave me shit,” he said. “Others got involved simply because they saw two thugs giving me shit and immediately [started] taking their side,” he said.

“It turned into a Domino effect,” says Hartsock. “It didn’t matter what I had to say. Everyone decided the thing now was to pile up on me.”

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel