Man says group stabbed him, but police skeptical

Costa Mesa police treated a man who said he and his friend were attacked by at least six men in a Westside parking lot early Saturday.

Shortly before 1:30 a.m., officers responded to a call at 845 W. 19th St. and treated a man in his 30s for a knife wound to the hand. According to Sgt. Stephanie Selinske, the man told officers that he and his friend had been accosted by “six to seven gang-type suspects” who robbed them of a wallet and cellphone and stabbed one of them in the hand before fleeing the scene on foot.

Selinske said detectives planned to investigate the incident, but she added that a responding officer on the scene had expressed skepticism about the men’s story — in part, he said, because they gave so few descriptions of the suspects.

“There’s a possibility ... they were with their friends and they had too much to drink, and their buddies attacked them,” Selinske said. “That’s what one of the officers was telling me out there. He said the victims were very intoxicated and they may have known the people who attacked them, and that’s why they weren’t giving any information.”

She noted that the men had refused additional medical treatment and declined to be photographed at the scene.

— Michael Miller