Model Accepts Date With Instagram Stranger, Gets Brutally Beaten And Robbed [Photos]
A burgeoning model from California took a chance and went out on a date with a man she met on Instagram last year, only to have the moment of spontaneity backfire and ultimately land her in a hospital with grave injuries.
Los Angeles native India Ali, 32, relayed to KTLA News that the matter began last July when she first caught a glimpse of 27-year-old James Baker on the social media app, and was immediately smitten by him.
https://twitter.com/therealeric916/status/862085442098909185
“He didn’t really look like a creep from his pictures,” Ali remarked, adding, “he looked like he had it going on.”
After reaching out to Baker on Instagram, the model and James hit things off enough to the point of moving their conversation from Instagram to a one-on-one date later that evening, which James filmed most of and shared to Instagram, as well.
India says she doesn’t remember much about Baker’s lens being on her so much, nor does she recall ever leaving the bar with him to drive back to his hotel room near Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), which her date also captured and posted to his Instagram profile.
The next thing she recalled, according to India, was waking up the next morning on a bed in Baker’s hotel room, with vomit and blood soaking the sheets that covered her partially clothed body.
“It was horrible. I woke up. I lifted my head up [and] I was lying in a puddle of throw-up,” India continued.
A scan around the room through her bleary eyes didn’t bring Ali much solace regarding her then-current predicament.
“So I look around and I see blood everywhere and my clothes [are] everywhere,” Ali said.
Things got worse, however, when the model looked in the mirror and saw a beaten and bloody reflection of her face staring back at her.
India Ali LA model: How my instagram date beat me up and robbed me https://t.co/JkH5bELnkC #India Ali #online dating #social media
— Scallywagandvagabond (@ScallywagNYC) May 10, 2017
Immediately, India went into an understandable panic.
“Oh my God. I can’t believe that happened. What if they come back and kill me,” she remembers thinking.
Realizing that both her cell phone and car were missing, India used the phone located in the hotel room to call for police and medical assistance.
“There’s blood all over the room,” a frantic Ali was recorded telling emergency operators during her 911 call.
“I’m hurt in my face,” she then responds when asked about the nature of her injuries.
Arriving medics rushed the injured Ali to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, where she was subsequently treated for a severe brain injury.
“She had been punched in the head so badly that it had caused a swelling in the brain,” Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney David Berger expressed to KTLA about the extent of India’s injuries.
Berger went on to explain that the model’s non-stop vomiting had also come as a result of Ali’s Instagram date’s actions.
“The brain, when it expands, has nowhere to go so it forces down – and that’s what triggers the vomit action. It [puts] pressures [on] the fourth vertebrae.”
Investigators were ultimately able to track Baker down through the “Find My iPhone” app installed on the model’s phone, which James was said to be using.
India Ali Shares The Story Of How She Was Assaulted By James Baker Who She Met On Instagram https://t.co/1gaXTQAOgr pic.twitter.com/AyDg1BBtfc
— OneRandomChick (@ORC_Blog) May 10, 2017
“Baker, who had prior convictions and was on bail for allegedly using fake credit cards,” the New York Daily News further details, “was found guilty of felony assault, auto theft and use of forged credit cards. His sentencing was postponed earlier this month.”
“I wouldn’t want anybody [else] to go and meet up with anybody that they don’t know,” the model, now recovered, implored the public.
“Please don’t ever do that. You have to value your life.”
Ali’s mother, Lydia O’Brien, mirrored her daughter’s sentiment.
“Everybody is posting pictures. If you eat a taco, you put it online, I guess that’s how people are meeting these days. But you have to now be aware that people are sick mentally and are just deranged,” she told the Daily News.
“You could be hurt,” the model’s mother warned potential daters on Instagram, “[or] even killed.”
[Featured Image by Carl Court/Getty Images]
