Witnesses saw youths hitting cars with snowballs at a downtown intersection.

NEWPORT CITY, Vt. (AP) – A 36-year-old man was listed in fair condition in the hospital Friday after an apparent altercation with a group of youths throwing snowballs.

Around 9 p.m. Thursday, Newport City police officers Ken Richardson and Karl Packer responded to a report that four youths were throwing snowballs at cars at the intersection of Main and Central streets.

When police arrived, they found Newport resident Mark St. Onge lying face down in the road, unconscious, with serious head and facial injuries.

A witness who had driven by the intersection claims to have seen St. Onge grab the coat of one of the snowball throwers.

St. Onge was taken to North Country Hospital and later to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, N.H., where he was reported in critical condition with serious head and facial injuries.

Police are not sure whether St. Onge was assaulted.

Anyone with information about this case is asked to call the Newport City Police Department at 334-6733 or 334-6734.


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