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Police are looking for suspects in two separate attacks involving baseball bats.
Investigators don't know if the attacks are related because one case may have been a random robbery. The motive in the other may have been jealousy.
The first attack happened last Tuesday at the softball complex near 5000 South and 2700 West in Taylorsville. Police are looking for two men who beat two people with a wooden martial arts sword and an aluminum bat.
One of the victims was beaten severely; his friend only had minor injuries.
The victims told police they were text messaging girls, and the suspects may have seen one of the messages and gotten jealous.
Police say the suspects were driving a dark blue or black Suzuki Reno Hatchback with temporary license tag in the rear window and a license plate frame from Bryson Auto.
"It's very concerning. You've got a victim here now that's in a local hospital that has severe head injury. He's in and out of a medically-induced coma," said Taylorsville police Detective Troy Martinez.
Police are also looking for suspects in another attack. Last Wednesday, a man was walking along 3200 West near 6700 South in West Jordan when a car pulled up next to him. A teenager holding a bat got out of the car and told the victim he had three seconds to give him everything he had.
Police say the teenager began beating the victim with the bat. When the victim tried to defend himself, two more people got out of the car and started beating him too.
A woman driving by saw the attack and called police, but it was too late. The suspects were gone when officers got there.
One of the suspects was described as wearing white Athletic Works shoes.
"This guy got a broken nose, had some stitches, had to go to the hospital. So, it could have been worse," said West Jordan police Lt. Bob Shober.
Police say there have been a couple of similar cases where kids will jump out of a car and rob someone walking down the street. Officers don't think they're related, but they want people to be aware of it.
E-mail: syi@ksl.com
