An 80-year-old man was beaten in the bathroom of his own home after an intoxicated neighbor entered the wrong house, according to police in Texas.
The attack happened at a home in San Antonio at about 1:20 a.m. March 25, according to an incident summary from the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office. A deputy responded to a call about a burglary in progress but soon learned the home invasion was likely an accident.
The deputy knocked on the front door but noticed it was undamaged, the report said. When the victim answered, he was limping, his shirt was torn and covered in food stains, and food from Taco Palenque — a regional Tex-Mex restaurant chain — was strewn across the home’s entrance and the bathroom.
The man said he was going to the bathroom when a “tall male” dressed in all black suddenly appeared, started yelling and attacked, “causing him great pain,” according to deputies. He was taken to a hospital for treatment.
Evidence at the scene, including a cellphone left in the bathroom, pointed deputies toward a neighbor, identified as Eric Collazo.
When speaking with Collazo, deputies noticed a “strong smell of alcoholic beverages,” the report said.
He told deputies that he entered the house believing it was his, mistook his neighbor for an intruder and attacked.
“I don’t play around,” he said, according to the report.
Collazo added that he had been able to enter the home using his own house key. Deputies took Collazo’s key, tested it on the neighbor’s front door and found that it worked, the report said.
“It is unknown as to how the key works at the victim’s residence, however, investigators believe the issue may be related to the builder of the residences,” BCSO officer Johnny Garcia told KSAT.
Collazo was booked into the Bexar County jail on a charge of injury to the elderly, records show. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for May 1.