Gaius Caesar
Describing him as "despicable and dishonest", Suetonius says that as a young man, Domitius was serving on the staff of his second cousin Gaius Caesar in the East, in AD 2. Domitius killed his freedman for refusing to drink as much as he was told. The reported reason was that the freedman did not get as drunk as Domitius did. On the Appian Way, Domitius was reported to have deliberately run over a child who was playing with his doll. At the Roman Forum, Domitius reportedly pulled out an eye of an equestrian because the equestrian openly criticized him. Although some historians such as Ronald Syme have argued that the Domitius who served with Gaius Caesar may have been an older brother of his and not Nero's father. Gaius Stern claims that the Eastern expedition is actually that of Germanicus in AD 17-19, if one assumes his birth to be in 2 BC and still interpret the violent actions to belong to Nero's father.