CLEVELAND (WJW) — A 92-year-old man was beaten, thrown to the ground and carjacked at gunpoint as he was about to walk inside his church Sunday morning. Cleveland police recovered his car, but the two young men who stole it are still at large.
“They rushed up there so quick and it’s young guys, you know. I couldn’t move that fast, they knocked me down and took the keys and took off with the car,” said Norval Stovall.
It was just after 7:00 a.m. Sunday.
Norval Stovall, 92, had just parked his 2015 Toyota RAV4 at Community AME Church on Lexington Avenue in Cleveland’s Hough neighborhood.
“They parked their car in front of the house next door and turned around and I thought they were going in the house, but they were slipping up behind on the side of the fence,” said Stovall.
Stovall said he arrived at church early to help other members prepare breakfast before service.
“When I got out of the car, I kind of had my head down and they were moving so fast and they knocked me down and took my car keys and started hitting on me, you know. (Did you get hurt at all?). Well, if I did, I didn’t feel it,” he said.
Stovall says the two young men, who were wearing masks, took off in his car, eastbound on Lexington Avenue. The Korean War vet says he banged on the church’s door and told two people inside. They called police after he told them he had been carjacked.
“They had a gun in my face,” he said. “They had it in my face and I didn’t know whether they were gonna kill me or not.”
Norval says he doubts his attackers knew how old he was and if they did, he doesn’t believe it would have mattered.
“I guess they didn’t know I was 92, they just said ‘Here is an old guy, we can get him. He can’t move very fast I don’t guess…I’m a church person, so I guess it’s just a sin in our lives around here, you know, that’s what I blame it on,” Stovall said.
