Rumble at Bull Pen started over man dancing with woman who his female cousin did not approve

Jon Johnson File Photo/Gila Herald: Officers responded to the Bull Pen bar early Sunday morning and came across a large group of people having a disagreement in the parking lot.

One man knocked unconscious; attacker arrested on warrant

By Jon Johnson

jonjohnsonnews@gmail.com

SAFFORD – A dust up involving numerous people at the Bull Pen bar at 912 W. Thatcher Blvd. in the early morning hours Sunday was reportedly started by a man’s choice of dancing partner.

Officers were dispatched to the bar’s parking lot at about 1:46 a.m. regarding a fight involving a large crowd. Multiple Safford officers and deputies with the Graham County Sheriff’s Office responded to the scene and located an unconscious man lying on his back in the parking lot. The man’s attacker, later identified as Jeremy Anthony Gomez, 24, of Safford, was taken into custody. 

According to police reports, there were about 30 or more people in the parking lot and officers had to pull two men away from each other before another fight started. 

Statements from those involved in the tiff and witnesses advised that the whole incident began when a woman told her cousin to stop dancing with a woman because she didn’t like her due to a previous relationship the dancer hand with another of the woman’s relatives. 

The dancer then got into a small argument with the woman on the dance floor and that argument migrated to the back patio, where multiple women surrounded the dancer and other women, according to witnesses and bar security footage. 

As the women began pushing each other, bouncers and bartenders were busy escorting the man who would later be assaulted out of the bar at a separate exit. Security footage then showed Gomez leave the bar from the south entrance, walk along the east side of the building to where the victim was and punch him without provocation, knocking him to the ground.