A resident of Wildwood Commons Apartments was arrested on battery charges after allegedly strangling a woman and breaking her phone.
A deputy responded to a domestic disturbance involving 23-year-old Brandell Demond Crossley at an undisclosed Coleman residence around 3:50 p.m. Tuesday, according to an arrest report from the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office.
Upon arrival, the deputy met the female victim in the front yard of the home. Paramedics quickly took her to a local hospital for further evaluation due to her complaints and injuries, including fresh red marks on the right side of her neck consistent with strangulation. She later gave a statement to law enforcement while at the hospital, the report said.
She advised that she had fallen asleep at the residence with Crossley, and she woke up to him going through her phone. He became angry, put both of his hands around the front of her neck and choked her until she could not breath as she lay on her bed. He let off only to choke her a second time, the report said.
He then slapped the victim several times on the left side of her face with an open right hand. The two went outside of the residence where he punched her three times on the right side of her head and slapped her again. He subsequently grabbed her $220 iPhone 11 and threw it against a vehicle in the yard, breaking the screen and rendering it unusable, the report said.
The victim’s mother added that she heard the pair screaming at each other from another room in the house. She told them to go outside and leave but did not see the altercation, the report said.
Crossley fled the scene before the deputy got there, and he was not found until Tuesday morning. Deputies got information about his whereabouts at his place in the Wildwood Commons Apartments, located at 1000 Lee St., Wildwood. They arrested him there and saw no marks or bruising on his person, the report said.
He was charged with battery by strangulation (domestic), criminal mischief (over $200 under $1,000) and battery. He was transported to the Sumter County Detention Center with bond set at $13,000. There was also a hold placed on him for a GPS monitor.