Witness: Bloodied Mom Ran to Neighbor's Home to Escape Son

Just before midnight on Monday, Johnny Chiu was still awake in his Durango Lane home when he heard a woman screaming for help.

He rushed to his window and saw his next door neighbor, an elderly woman, with blood all over her face and arms yelling for help and running across the street.

"I saw her knocking on the door across the street and then she went inside," Chiu said.

"About a minute later, I saw a man with a stick or bat go across the street," he said.

Chiu said it was dark and he couldn't tell if the man tried to get into the house the woman had entered, but he saw him sit on the porch there.

The man was Aaron Ricks, 27, who police say is the son of the woman who escaped to the neighbor's house.

Chiu then watched as several police cars arrived on his street. Officers yelled at Ricks to put down the bat. When he didn't, they fired a non-lethal projectile at him.

"(Ricks) looked out of it," Chui said. "He wasn't responding when they told him to put down the bat. When he got hit, he slowly dropped the bat."

Officers then arrested Ricks on suspicion of attempted murder. He's currently being held at the Martinez Detention Facility.

The woman is recovering from significant injuries at John Muir Medical Center, police say.

Chiu said he had never witnessed any problems at the home before.

Another family on the block, the Robins (they declined to give first names), said the Ricks had lived in the home since the early 1980s and the woman had four sons. They also never noticed any trouble at the home.

"It's just terrible," a neighbor said. "I hope she's going to be OK."