Mike Vitar, widely known for his role as Benjamin Franklin ‘Benny the Jet’ Rodriguez in The Sandlot, withdrew from acting in 1997 and now works as a firefighter after being charged with assault.
Mike Vitar, a popular child actor in the 1990s, performed in a number of films. The Sandlot, D2: The Mighty Ducks, and D3: The Mighty Ducks are some of his most well-known flicks.
Throughout the 1990s, the former actor appeared in a variety of different productions, cementing his reputation as one of the most successful child actors of the era. Despite this, Vitar quit acting at the age of 19 in 1997 after appearing in an episode of the medical drama Chicago Hope.
He worked as an Emergency Medical Technician for a while after leaving show business (EMT).
In 2002, he became a firefighter with the Los Angeles Fire Department after earning the necessary experience and skills.
Charges of Assault
Vitar has had his fair share of run-ins with the law, including an assault charge in 2016. After he and his two co-firefighters, Eric Carpenter and Thomas Molnar, attacked a man in a Halloween night brawl, he risked substantial prison time.
According to accounts, the 42-year-old and his pals approached and assaulted Samuel Chang, a 22-year-old graduate student who was handing out candy in a gated community, but the assailants suspected him of passing out “drug-laced” candies, which proved out to be false afterwards.
Chang was also said to be under the influence of PCP, according to the firefighters (a type of drug). However, medical investigations revealed that he had no evidence of the substance in his system. Chang, on the other hand, believes he smelt alcohol on the breath of at least one firefighter. One of them choked him and beat him so badly during the attack that he went into cardiac arrest and had to be resuscitated.
Vitar was released on $30,000 bond at first, but was later charged with misdemeanor violence, which he did not challenge. As a result, the three were charged in criminal court and were awarded $7.2 million in damages.
Vitar was sentenced to three months of probation and 90 days of community service in the end. He was also suspended without pay for six months.
He continues to serve the Los Angeles Fire Department and lives in Los Angeles with his family as of 2021. Vitar is married to Kym Allen, a renowned photographer. Eli, Wesley, and Norah Paige Paige are the couple’s three children. They married in 2006 and have three children.
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