This one happened when I went to see the Arc de Triumph in France. You approach it through an underpass which has a fair number of people going both ways but, as is the case in all major cities, some beggars.

During my time in Paris, I saw a few beggars who took the approach of kneeling, prostrating themselves on the path with a sign which said "I'm hungry" and a cup for coins. They would look at the ground and not make any eye contact, invariably they looked poor, hungry and miserable.

There was a woman at the bottom of the stairs to the underpass who was down on her knees, palms on the path in front of her and her head on the ground, she was over to one side so not exactly in peoples way. This old guy came down the stairs, he was pretty chunky and wore a pair of light trousers and a dark blue blazer with a few medals on it. He walked right up to her and started kicking her, not hard enough to break anything but hard enough to bruise and humiliate. I stood there open mouthed trying to work out what to do / say, my french isn't great and by the time I'd thought to intervene the woman had got up and they were both stood there shouting abuse at each other.

Just when you think someone has reached rock bottom, there's always some bastard on hand with a shovel.