Funnel Cake Feud

Funny how “Funnel cake worth fighting for” never took off as a tagline for Spring Fling, even though it contributed to an altercation between two men at the 2009 carnival.

University of Arizona Police Department bike patrol officers spotted a fight going on between two men near one of the rides. A woman was attempting to drag one of the men away from the fight, telling him, “We need to leave now.” 

The man did not seem to be taking her advice and instead proceeded to yell at the crowd.

One of the officers grabbed the man’s arms and instructed him to sit on the ground.

The man told the officers he and his friend, the woman who had been pulling him away, were standing in line for funnel cake, when a second man, who was also with a woman, pushed him. The first man pushed back, which led to a hostile verbal exchange.

Shortly after, the first man and his friend saw the second man and his friend in a different area of Spring Fling. The men began to argue again, which this time escalated to the physical fight police broke up.

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Police then interviewed the second man, who gave a significantly different account of how it all went down.

The second man told the officers that, while waiting in the funnel cake line, the first man’s friend pushed the second man’s friend, and that’s what started the initial argument. The groups then separated, but spotted each other again about half an hour later.

According to the second man, the first man walked up to him and began to argue. The second man was under the impression that the other man had the intention to hurt the second man’s friend, so he stood between the two. That’s when the fight began.

The second man’s female friend was knocked down during the fight. The woman with the first man was alleged by the second man to have kicked her in the face. She also took the woman with the second man’s cell phone and car keys.

The officers noted the friend had significant bruising on her face. She told them she was worried that the other woman would be able to get into her car. 

The officers sent Spring Fling workers to watch her car until her parents brought her a spare set of keys.

The first man refused to give the officers his friend’s full name, though he did give them her first name and told them she was his new stepsister. Officers escorted the first man off the premises.

Flinging profanity and swinging fists

Watch your profanity, or watch out for these hands. That was the case at the 2007 Spring Fling at Rillito Park, when a woman took a swing at a man after hearing him curse.

A UAPD bicycle patrol officer was alerted to the assault by a UA student, who said that his friend had just been hit by the woman.

The friend told the officer that the woman had asked them to stop cursing, but they had ignored her. That’s when she began to hit them.

The friend said he had not been the one cursing when the woman threatened to hit him. He also said she struck him twice in the head.

The student said she struck his friend in the left side of his face, knocking the hat off his head. She then proceeded to punch the back of his friend’s head.

The student wanted to press charges on the woman for assault.

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The officer went to talk to the woman, who had been standing nearby. She told the officer the young men had been using profane language.

She said that while standing in a line, the group of people behind her kept loudly using the f-word. When she asked them to stop, they cursed at her and said, “You’re not the boss.”

This made her angry, she said, so she began to hit them. She admitted to knowing her behavior was wrong and that she had anger issues. The officer cited and released the woman for assault.

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