Attack Hurts Retiree Both in Body, Soul : Crime: Teen-age muggers break her bones and her spirit, net 50 cents. ‘I’m never going for a walk again,’ she says.

GARDEN GROVE —  When 72-year-old Justine Byrnes moved to a Garden Grove retirement home earlier this month she vowed not to become a wallflower. So after a few weeks of bingo and television, and eager for a change of pace, she set out on foot for a local shopping center.

She got as far as the alley behind the retirement home when two teen-agers attacked her, leaving her with a shattered elbow, a fractured shoulder and fear of her new neighborhood.

“I went to the retirement home to be taken care of,” she said. “I got taken care of all right.”

The teen-age boys took Byrnes’ purse and fled. The mugging about 11 a.m. Sunday happened so fast, Byrnes said, that she couldn’t identify her assailants. But she said another resident saw the boys throw the purse onto the roof of a bowling alley behind the retirement home in the 13800 block of Dawson Street.

Police arrested two youths about an hour later, and the witness identified them, Byrnes said.

Both teen-agers remain in custody at Orange County Juvenile Hall, a spokesperson there said.

Byrnes said the boys took 50 cents from her purse. The $1.60 that remained was recovered, said Garden Grove Police Sgt. Larry Ebelt.

Because of her injuries, Byrnes said, she will spend two weeks in a nursing home before moving back to the retirement home.

In retrospect, Byrnes said, she was foolish for taking a shortcut down the alley.

“It was a bad move,” she said. “I feel I was stupid because I thought I could protect myself.”

But she also was “just as bitter” on Wednesday as she was the day of the attack, she said. The only consolation is that “it will get them (the teen-agers) off the street.”

When asked when she would venture out again, she said: “Never. I’m not ever going for a walk again.”