Irvine : 3 Stabbed, 2 Arrested In Rock Concert Fight

Three people were hurt in stabbings, one of them seriously, and two others were arrested after a fight broke out at the Irvine Meadows Amphitheater during Saturday night’s concert by Echo & the Bunnymen, authorities said Sunday.

The melee started about 8:30 p.m. when a group of rowdy concertgoers pushed several people in front of them, Police Sgt. Jeff Kermode said.

Manuel Mojica, 27, of San Gabriel, was listed in serious condition Sunday at Mission Community Hospital in Mission Viejo with a stab wound to the liver, hospital officials said. Louie Papa, 25, of Los Angeles, and a 16-year-old Anaheim boy, whose name was withheld, were treated at the same hospital for stab wounds and later released, Kermode said.

Two suspects in the stabbing incident--identified as Dennis Paul Gonzales, 19, of Garden Grove, and Joseph Martin Gonzales, 20, of Santa Ana--were arrested about an hour after the fight as they were leaving the concert, Kermode said. Both were booked into the Orange County Jail on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon, he said.

An Irvine police officer investigating the incident said amphitheater security officers had ordered Gonzales and several friends to behave themselves shortly before the stabbings, following complaints from patrons that the group had been spilling drinks and harassing people.

The victims of the knife attack apparently were walking up a ramp at the concert when the suspects began shoving them from behind, and the two groups began yelling at each other, Kermode said.