Speaking of courthouse filings, our sister paper in Houston and KTRK-TV, the ABC affiliate down thataways, bring news of a lawsuit filed here by a 25-year-old Chevron petroleum engineer who claims he was assaulted on New Year's Eve at the Magnolia Hotel downtown.
According to the suit, Ivan Pinney of The Woodlands was attending a shindig in the Pegasus Grand Ballroom at the Magnolia when, he alleges, Cameron McGuire, a catcher with the United League Baseball's Edinburg Roadrunners, started getting overly friendly with one of Pinney's friend's girlfriends. Pinney says he asked McGuire to leave her alone. Pinney's attorney, Randy Sorrels, tells the Houston Press his client thought the issue had been resolved -- until McGuire had "taken his shirt off, he takes a running start from Ivan's
left-hand side, punching Ivan in the left side of the face, knocking
him out. It broke his orbital socket, broke his cheekbone...shattered
his nose, detached his retina." At some point, Sorrels says, Lance Broadway -- a former Grand Prairie High School and TCU pitcher now in the Toronto Blue Jays organization -- also got involved.
After the jump, KTRK's report about the assault, which Pinney says caused him to lose vision in one eye and his sense of smell. ("It's absolutely turned my life upside-down.") The Dallas Police Department does have an offense report on file, and has classified it as an aggravated assault.