Aug 30, 2025 3 min read

Imagine sitting at an outdoor concert, enjoying the evening’s warm summer breeze, your attention fixed on the musical act performing on stage.

Your favorite artist starts the second song of his set, and you begin to sing along. Suddenly, out of nowhere, an object is hurled in your direction, striking you in the back of the head and knocking you unconscious. You awaken a few seconds later to searing pain as security guards and other strangers gather around.

As unbelievable as it sounds, that hypothetical scenario can – and did – happen, to Michael Mollenkopf, at the recent Jason Aldean concert at The Pavilion at Star Lake.

Mollenkopf traveled to the Burgettstown venue from Columbiana, Ohio, with his daughter to watch the country musician perform Aug. 9. He recounted the incident in an interview with the newspaper a week later, in the hope that someone with information about the perpetrator would read his story and come forward.

“The next thing I know, something hard hit my head, and I blacked out for a couple seconds,” Mollenkopf said in the interview.

That “something” turned out to be a full can of beer, hurled with enough force to cause multiple concussions, headaches and then a stutter.

Isabella Dickey, Mollenkopf’s daughter, was standing next to him when he was struck. She described hearing a loud “pop” and getting sprayed with beer.

“I hope whoever did it realizes they actually hurt somebody,” Dickey told the newspaper.

What provoked the attack? Was Mollenkopf the intended target? Or was he just the victim of alcohol-induced horseplay that got out of hand, and he had the misfortune of being in the cross-fire?

We may never know. Three weeks later, there have been no arrests.

After the same concert ended and people were walking to their vehicles, a man was seen attacking a woman in a venue parking lot, documented in a video posted to social media by another concertgoer. It shows three women pulling the man off the woman, and the man turning and punching one in the head, knocking her to the ground.

No arrests have been made in that assault either.

The savage behavior demonstrated in both attacks, the utter lack of civility and regard for fellow humans, is both appalling and alarming.

We can speculate that both incidents were likely fueled by drugs or alcohol, and it appears that unnecessary harm was inflicted upon innocent people who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Would a greater police presence at the venue prevent future problems?

Perhaps, but common sense and simple decency are attributes no amount of police presence can inspire.

At the risk of sounding preachy, we are compelled to draw upon our childhood lessons, the one about actions having consequences – many unintended. Consider that when entertaining the notion of lobbing a projectile into a crowd of people.

“Nobody deserves what I’m going through. It was very uncalled for,” Mollenkopf said.

Indeed it was.