A brutal gang battered a good Samaritan who tried to help a young girl in distress.
Stephen Kelsey was rushed to hospital after the thugs turned on him, chasing him along a street before launching a brutal attack.
The 63-year-old was knocked unconscious and police are trawling CCTV in a bid to identify the culprits.
Dad-of-three Stephen told Teeside Live he'd just locked up his friend's shop when he spotted a girl apparently in trouble.
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He recalled: "I tried to help, they came at me and I started to run, but they caught up with me further up the street and I took a beating.
"If you see someone in trouble you jump in, don’t you? It’s natural instinct.
"I suppose they thought I was trying to stick my nose into someone else's business.
"It seemed like it took a nano-second but I was probably on the ground for about five minutes. They were kicking **** out of me.
"It was like 'let's get this guy, we've got him, boom boom boom'.
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"I grabbed hold of my wallet, because it had a lot of money in it, and took the beating.
"I remember waking up after being knocked out. The ambulance was there."
Stephen suffered a fractured eye socket, severe bruising, a leg injury and lost two front teeth in the attack on Redcar High Street.
But he says wouldn't hesitate to try and help if he saw someone in distress again.
"If I see someone in difficulties, I'll step in," he continued. "I would always do that. I would always try and help somebody.
"Someone was in distress and I needed to help. If I got a kicking, I got a kicking - I didn't think about that. And I suppose it could have been a lot worse.
