Restaurant Owner Sticks Up For Worker Charged with Bludgeoning Man

The owner of a Joliet restaurant stuck up for one of her workers after he was arrested for allegedly bludgeoning a man with a metal pipe.

Maria Hernandez, 39, owner of Dona Chelo on North Scott Street, defended employee Omar Cardona in a petition for a protective order.

In her petition, Hernandez tells of 50-year-old Everardo Plasencia coming to her restaurant on Sunday and allegedly making an obnoxious scene.

Plasencia, who is “missing one eye” and “wears dark glasses” was drunk when he got there, Hernandez said.

“He started arguing with me but I didn’t understand what he was saying,” Hernandez said. “Omar Cardona, my worker, intervened and asked him to leave the premises because there were customers with their children eating and they were afraid of Everardo screaming and yelling but Everardo refused to leave. I then called the police and Everardo did the same thing. I couldn’t explain (to) the officer what happened because I don’t speak English. Everardo called his daughter who speaks English and she came to the parking lot and talked to the officer. I don’t know what explanation she could (have) given to the officer but my worker was arrested.”

The police said Cardona, 38, was arrested because they found Plasencia bleeding profusely from a gash to his forehead and from other lacerations. He suffered this gash and the other lacerations when Cardona viciously beat him with a metal pipe, possibly a mop handle, police said.

Plasencia was taken to Silver Cross Hospital, where he was strapped onto a backboard and fitted with a neck brace, police said.

Cardona was jailed on a charge of aggravated battery. He was released two days later when Hernandez paid his $3,000 bail.

The problems with Plasencia started with an altercation two weeks prior during which Hernandez broke his cell phone, she said in her petition.

“Everardo came to my restaurant in the morning and started calling me names, ‘piggy, slut, prostitute, etc.,’” she said. “He came very close to me and I was so scared that I slapped him, grabbed his phone and threw it to the ground. Later on, Everardo came back and was claiming (he wanted) to be paid $700 for the phone.”

The day of the alleged beating, Plasencia sent his daughter, possibly the same one he summoned to speak English to the cops, over to Dona Chelo so she could get the restaurant’s “insurance card because she needed it for legal purposes,” Hernandez said. “I didn’t give it to her and she became very angry and left the restaurant.”