A car crash on Hilton Head highway turned into a parking lot assault, police say

A minor car accident lead to a fight and a third degree assault and battery charge when one driver choked the other Friday night in a parking lot on Hilton Head Island, according to a Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office report.

The assault happened just before 9 p.m. in The Legends Apartments parking lot on Union Cemetery Road, the report said.

A Bluffton man was driving his Lexus on U.S. 278 when he saw a car “flying up behind him,” the report said. He switched lanes but the car continued to follow him, the report said.

A man driving a Honda said the man in the Lexus was “driving very aggressively and kept slamming on his breaks,” the report said. The cars collided during one of the lane changes, the report said.

Both drivers pulled to the side of the road but the man in the Honda got scared and drove away when he saw the Lexus driver start running toward him, the report said.

Both cars later turned into The Legends Apartments parking lot before the Lexus driver charged the man and grabbed him by the throat before throwing him to the ground, the report said.

The Lexus driver said “his years in military law enforcement led him to a certain train of thought that he couldn’t let the suspect get away,” the report said.

No charges were pressed, the report said.