A 36-year-old Georgia man is facing criminal charges after he was accused of strangling his girlfriend’s child at Walt Disney World’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa.
When his girlfriend and the child got upset about what happened, Patrick Young accused them of being a “liberal [expletive],” according to the Orange County Sheriff’s arrest report.
Young, of St. Marys, Georgia, pleaded not guilty to child abuse and battery by strangulation, which are both third-degree felony charges.
The situation unfolded on April 2, after Young had been drinking that day, the report said. Young and his girlfriend had been living together for about a year when they went on vacation to Disney.
Young denied trying to hurt the child and said he had been playing around.
The child recounted, “I’m not positive what started it but he grabbed me around my neck and started choking me with his forearm,” according to the arrest report. “First I thought he was joking but then I started actually being unable to breathe.”
The girl’s mother, who saw the girl’s face turn blue, began yelling at him to free her daughter. Young held the child for 10 to 15 seconds as the child tapped his arm, and then he let her go.
“I dropped to the ground and started crying and gasping for air because I could not breathe at all. I moved away and he tried to pull me back,” the girl told the sheriff’s office.
Young got angry at everyone’s reactions.
“He started to become irate and saying he didn’t understand why everyone was so upset,” the child’s mother said in the arrest report. “When I told him because she couldn’t breathe and was crying, he said, ‘That sounds like a liberal fucking [expletive]!’ I told the girls to grab their things, and we would go.”
The child said in the report, “My mom was trying to defend me, and he yelled that my mom trying to defend me is a ‘liberal fucking [expletive] response.’ My mom told us to get our stuff and he started yelling at everyone about literally anything and everything he could.”
The child’s mother called 911, and the Florida Department of Children and Families was notified.
When deputies interviewed him, Young said he was wrestling with his girlfriend’s daughter when he put her in a chokehold, but he did not mean to hurt her.
“Patrick stated he did not think anything was wrong until his girlfriend told him to stop and called the police,” reads the arrest report.
A deputy did not see any bruises or marks on her neck, but it was clear the girl had been crying and had puffy cheeks.
Young’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
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