Police Seek Pair Who Beat Man Walking Along Beach Bike Path

Aivars Dorss, a mildly retarded man who makes a living washing windows, used to walk to the beach from his Ventura home and watch the surfers. Now, he panics at the thought.

Dorss, 49, was on one of his walks near Surfer’s Point on Tuesday when two teen-agers on bicycles beat him up for no apparent reason while nearby beach-goers made no effort to help him.

“I used to walk there quite a lot,” he said Friday, his broken wrist in a sling. “After what happened, I won’t go back.”

Police have no suspects in the attack that occurred about 4 p.m. on the bike path, a popular spot in the summer that attracts walkers, bicyclists and swimmers. Although officers patrol the area on bicycles, they said it is not known as a local trouble spot.

The attack baffled and angered Dorss’s parents.

“This happened in the daytime,” Leontine Dorss said. “What happens in the evening? I’m amazed this would happen in such a nice city.”

The couple were in Ventura on Friday to help their son get to a doctor’s appointment. His wrist was broken in two places. His ear was cut and his back was bruised.

“What was on their minds?” his mother asked. “He doesn’t drink or smoke. . . . He’s a good, nice man.”

The family immigrated to the United States from Latvia in 1951. Aivars Dorss still speaks with a heavy accent. He is a shy, soft-spoken man who is obsessed with airplanes. His room is filled with pictures of airplanes, and he attends air shows. His other passion is bicycling, and he belongs to a bicycle club.

He gave police an account of the incident the evening it happened, but he was too afraid to return to the scene with them to find his attackers, police said.

He was walking home along the bike path when two male juveniles approached him on their bicycles.

“They looked very mad and one of them said a bad word,” he said, explaining hesitantly that they used an obscenity to tell him to get out of the way.

They kicked him, and he started to run. They chased him, hit him and tore his shirt.

“Then one guy tackled me and threw me to the ground,” he said. That’s when he fell on his hand, injuring it.

“I called for help,” he said. “There were people there. They didn’t do anything.”

The boys disappeared. He walked home, holding his swollen wrist. His landlady took him to the hospital.

He described his attackers as white juveniles, 15 to 17 years old, with blond hair. They were wearing white T-shirts, long pants and tennis shoes and were riding mountain bicycles.

Dorss said his main concern now is collecting disability payments for six weeks while his wrist heals. He has been a window washer for 17 years, the time he has lived on his own in Ventura. He gets up each day at 4 a.m. to be on the job by 5 a.m.

Police are investigating the incident, Sgt. Bob Anderson said.

“We have no leads,” he said. “We’re still hoping someone will come forward.”