Rock Singer Injured in Run-In With Stage Guard : Concert: Artist says he was attacked for no reason after punk reunion. But the security watchman says he acted in self-defense.

Rock singer Rik L Rik said Wednesday that a concert security guard attacked and injured him last Friday night, moments after he had finished performing at the Old World Festival Hall.

The singer, whose real name is Rick Elerick, said the attack was unprovoked and left him with a gash over his left eye that took 11 stitches to close. But the guard, James Hinton, gave a very different account Wednesday, saying he struck Elerick in self-defense after Elerick lunged at him.

Elerick, 29, an Anaheim-based veteran of the Southern California punk and alternative rock scene, had been the top-billed performer at the show, a punk reunion concert dubbed “Return to Beach Blvd” that drew more than 800 people, according to the promoter, NKOTB Productions. Hinton, 26, of Costa Mesa, said he was working the show as head of stage security for NKOTB. He said he regularly handles security at weekly New Klub on the Block shows at Costa Mesa’s Newport Roadhouse.

According to both Elerick and Hinton, the show had turned into an ongoing turf battle over who would control the stage: the performer or the security guard.

Elerick and the two other acts, the Crowd and the Simpletones, sang from a square stage that fans surrounded on three sides. While Elerick sang, Hinton was stationed on the stage, and a group of about six women, one of them Hinton’s wife, sat on the stage floor, their backs against a railing.

Hinton and his wife, Kelly, said that Elerick repeatedly hovered over her, moving his pelvis near her face in a way they felt was deliberately suggestive and insulting. Hinton said that at one point in the show, Elerick almost struck him with a microphone stand--a move Hinton took as deliberate but that Elerick said was the unintentional result of a spontaneous stage movement.

Elerick denied that he was acting suggestively toward Kelly Hinton. He said he was directing his performance toward the audience beyond the rail, and that “any contact I had with her was incidental. It was certainly not intentional. Any kind of sensual movement was (performing) sensuality, like Mick Jagger or Elvis Presley.”

Things got more heated, Elerick said, when Hinton tried to keep him away from the side of the stage where Hinton’s wife was sitting.

“There was an angry confrontation,” Elerick said. “He was sort of blocking me from going over there, and I had no idea why. He was stopping me from doing my show in the most effective way.

“It became sort of a game,” Elerick continued. “I was testing him to see how far I could lean over that side of the stage.”

According to Hinton, Elerick taunted him by singing into his face and barking abusive comments at him into the microphone, so that they were audible to the audience.

Hinton said that when the performance ended, he approached Elerick to complain.

“I was intending to tell him what I thought, that he was an idiot, that he’s got to learn some manners. I didn’t go over there to hurt him,” said the security guard, who gave his size as 6 feet, 3 inches and more than 200 pounds. “He started screaming at me again, and spitting in my face. He lunged toward me, and I defended myself. It took a matter of a few seconds. I defended myself, and I turned and walked away.”

Elerick, who said he is about 6 feet tall and weighs 140 pounds, said he was sitting on or beside the stage after the show when “out of nowhere, I saw a blur and this guy started punching me. Eventually he was pulled off of me, probably (after) about 15 seconds.”

Steve Dietrich, a friend of Elerick’s, said he was sitting in a chair next to Elerick when “out of nowhere, the guy started whaling at Rik. He knocked him off the chair and kept hitting him. Rik was sitting there, absolutely nonviolent and defenseless” when the attack took place.

Elerick said he consulted a lawyer Wednesday “to find out what my options are.”

“I feel something like this shouldn’t go unpunished,” said Elerick’s manager, Brian Yamato. “It was completely out of hand, undeserved and unwarranted. There should be some sort of compensation.”

Craig McGahey of KNOTB said he was not in the hall while the friction between Elerick and Hinton developed and came to a head. “If I’d seen it, I would have stopped it,” he said. McGahey said he has heard both sides’ accounts.

“I like Rik, and I like (Hinton),” the promoter said. “I don’t want to be in the middle. I’m bummed.”