A brawl between two men at a Santa Monica residential complex on Saturday, July 12 escalated to both men being arrested – one charged with attempted murder after producing a knife and stabbing the other man during the fight.
Officers of the Santa Monica Police Department were called out to the 1500 block of Fifth Street at 12:05 am on this day in order to check upon one of the residents (victim) of the building in question because this resident had been reported as having blood oozing from his head.
As the officers were speeding to the location they received a radio update that informed them that there was a suspect at the scene who had apparently punched the victim.
Upon arrival the officers noticed that there was a large pool of blood in the courtyard of the building as well as a broken clay flowerpot.
The officers followed the blood trail to one of the apartments in the complex and were greeted by a man who was bleeding profusely from the head.
This bleeding man was uncooperative with the officers.
The officers reviewed CCTV footage and observed two people arguing in the video.
The film continued to show that one of the subjects had challenged the other to a fight and that mutually agreed combat had subsequently taken place.
The video showed that during the battle one of the combatants pulled out a knife and stabbed the other one with it.
The one who had been stabbed then grabbed the clay flowerpot and hit the other one in the head with it, thus causing the bleeding.
Both of these men were taken to a hospital for medical treatment and then arrested.
The first suspect was a 35-year-old Santa Monica resident who was charged with attempted murder and had bail set at $1 million, while the second, aged 49, and also of Santa Monica was charges with assault with a deadly weapon.
Bail for the second suspect was set at $30,000.
Editor’s Note: These reports are part of a regular police coverage series entitled “Alert Police Blotter” (APB), which injects some minor editorial into certain police activities in Santa Monica. Not all of The Mirror’s coverage of incidents involving police are portrayed in this manner. More serious crimes and police-related activities are regularly reported without editorial in the pages of the Santa Monica Mirror and its website, smmirror.com.
