Sleeping man attacked with a bat

BRIDGEPORT — A sleeping man suffered broken bones, cuts and bruises when he was attacked by an intruder with a bat on Tuesday night, police said.

But although the victim originally reported the incident as a home invasion, investigators said Wednesday that a woman who lives at 54 Evers Street had asked a male friend to remove the man, because she was concerned for her daughter’s safety.

The woman described the man, who was asleep in her home, as both “a friend’’ and “abusive,’’ and told police that he had refused to leave, so she did.

But then the woman became worried for the safety of her daughter left behind, so she called the suspect, Neftali Lugo, and asked him to “remove’’ the unwanted guest, according to the incident report.

Lugo went to the woman’s house shortly after 8 p.m., woke the man up and argued with him before striking him several times with an aluminum bat, police said.

The first arriving officers found the victim, his head wrapped in a bloody towel and with pools of blood around him, being tended to by several women. “He came in and invaded my house and beat me,’’ the man told police. “I was sleeping and it was kind of dark. I started running for my life but he kept hitting me with the bat like crazy and I fell on the ground.’’

The woman arrived home while medics were still attending to the victim and at first she denied knowing him, police said. Officers asked the woman to enter the house and secure her dog, and then entered, following a trail of blood from the front door down a long hallway and into a back bedroom, where a door with a dead bolt had been forced open and more blood covered a bureau and rug.

Lugo had remained on the scene and told police that he was trying to get the man to leave when the man attacked him and Lugo defended himself. “I just like blacked out and hit him,’’ the suspect said.

A witness told police that she had seen Lugo hitting the man with the bat, and that the suspect told her that the victim was being beaten “because he likes to molest little girls.’’

The victim was transported to Bridgeport Hospital.

Lugo, 24, was charged with assault, breach of peace and disorderly conduct, and was held overnight on a $25,000 bond.