The family of 53-year-old Albert Vasquez is asking for help finding the people who brutally beat a gay hairdresser outside a West Hollywood nightclub nearly two weeks ago.
“It’s been 10 days and nothing,” said sister Gloria Jimenez. “He’s just saying he was attacked.”
Jimenez said his brother and friends were walking back and forth between a gym bar and Heart WeHo in Santa Monica when Vasquez was punched outside a crowded nightclub. She hopes witnesses who saw what happened to her brother will come forward.
“We know he was at a bar with certain friends and he walked from that bar to another bar because they were next to each other,” Jimenez said. .
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said they received a report of a person in need of medical attention around 11 p.m. on April 5, but Vasquez was not found. Jimenez said his brother was taken to the hospital by paramedics. Investigators learned of the attack four days after Vazquez woke up after surgery, investigators said.
“His skull was fractured in two places,” she said. “Because my brain was inflamed, we had to remove part of my scalp to enlarge my brain.”
Vasquez moved from New York to West Hollywood during the pandemic. His family fears the attack may have been a hate crime.
“I’m hearing a lot of different things and I don’t know what to believe at this point,” Jimenez said.
Surveillance cameras were installed on the street, but Vazquez’s family has not been able to view the footage, and it is unclear whether deputies have seen it.
It is not clear whether Vasquez suffered any permanent damage from the beating. However, it is expected that he will need treatment in the future to learn how to walk and talk.
The family hopes anyone who witnessed the attack will come forward to bring justice.
“God is great,” Jimenez said. “We trust in God that the truth will prevail.”
