A fight at the dinner table led to one man's arrest Saturday night.

Police were called to a home on Tara Drive where a 12-year-old boy and his mother's boyfriend had gotten into an argument that turned physical. When they arrived, they spoke with the boy's mother who reportedly told them her son and boyfriend got into an argument at dinner.

The boy told officers that he was sitting at the table eating corn on the cob when his mother's boyfriend told him it was time for bed. The juvenile said he wasn't going to bed and that he wanted to read his Bible instead. The argument became even more heated, and he admitted that he began yelling at his mother's boyfriend, later identified as 24-year-old Alex Bradley Brown, and that he threw some of his corn kernels at him. In retaliation, he said Brown threw some corn at the juvenile as well.

According to the juvenile, Brown grabbed him by the back of the neck, punched him in the stomach and pushed him onto a wooden rocking chair that was on the floor upside down. He said one of the corners of the chair poked him in the side and was able to show officers where it had broken the skin.

The child's mother said she told Brown to leave her son alone and then left the room. She said she did not see the incident, but that she heard her son crying and saw him on the floor. She said that Brown told her he was leaving, and she could call the police, which she did, according to reports.

A lieutenant familiar with the juvenile and his mother arrived on the scene and asked the mother to see her child's room. When the officers asked the boy - who had taken them to his room - to turn on the light so they could see inside, he reportedly told them he could not because the circuit breaker was flipped off. When asked, the mother allegedly told officers that she and Brown had flipped the circuit breaker in her son's room because the boy had tampered with the light switch in the bathroom and that she was not going to restore light to his room until he told them what he had done in the bathroom.

Officers found that the child had done nothing to the bathroom switch, but that it was simply a short circuit.
Officers used flashlights to view the child's bedroom and reported that inside was a small wooden bed frame (no mattress), a sheet and a pillow. He had been sleeping like that for two weeks.

The child's mother called Brown (who was in Lithonia at the time) and told him to come back to speak with officers. Brown said that he had not pushed or punched the juvenile but had tried to restrain him in a bear hug, and since the child was fighting him, they both fell on the rocking chair.

Brown was arrested and charged with simple battery under the Family Violence Act. The child's mother was advised that an investigation was being opened by the Department of Family and Children Services regarding her child's living conditions.