JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A man was arrested after police said another man was taken to the hospital with severe injuries following a carjacking Tuesday morning in Jacksonville's Lakeshore South neighborhood.
Officers were called about 6:15 a.m. to a home on Retaw Street and Colonial Avenue.
According to the police report from the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, a man in his 40s had just dropped off a friend and as he was sitting in his car outside of the home, another man attacked him with a metal pipe, grabbed him out of the car and struck him several more times before stealing the car.
The victim was hospitalized with a fractured skull, broken nose and multiple cuts, an arrest report states.
Police said the stolen vehicle was later found abandoned not far from the crime scene. The vehicle was then taken in for evidence processing.
The two women who knew the victim witnessed the robbery and beating.
According to the incident report, the two women both gave police the name of the man they believe attacked the victim and stole his car. The police report states the women said the suspect, Billy Alan Davis, was the ex-boyfriend of one of the women. They said he had been at their house the night before and there had been an argument.
Davis, 46, was booked into the Duval County jail at 8:28 p.m. Tuesday on charges of carjacking with a deadly weapon, motor vehicle theft, petit theft and resisting police without violence, online jail records show.
Davis was on supervised release after a July 2016 conviction in Duval County for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. (Florida Department of Correction photo)
Dave Grow, a neighborhood watch commander, said what happened Tuesday morning is only a sample of the escalating crime in the area.
"It's worse during the summer. Christmas holiday, people have packages delivered. I've had UPS drivers tell me they've been followed," Grow said. "Everybody in this area is pretty much on edge."