A 46-year-old homeless person was arrested and taken off to jail where he was charged with assault with a deadly weapon on Wednesday, Dec. 30.
At 8 pm officers of the Santa Monica Police Department were flagged down in the 1100 block of Palisades Park by a couple (male and female) who told them that they had just been threatened by a man with a knife.
The couple said that they had been out walking and were about to sit on a bench near a railing in the west side of the park when the suspect had approached them and told them that they needed to leave the area.
The suspect then added that he was “going to stab them” and the female half of the couple stated that she had seen a knife in the suspect’s hand as he threatened them with the stabbing.
The couple added that when they had informed this man that they were calling the police the man had picked up his belongings (that had been placed on the ground nearby), piled them onto his bicycle and cycled away in a northbound direction.
The couple gave the officers a description of the suspect that the officers shared with other patrolling officers in the area via police radio.
A few moments after the officers had put the call out to other officers they received a call via radio from another officer to say that he had apprehended a man who fit the description near the intersection of Ninth Street and Wilshire Boulevard.
The victims were transported by the police to that area whereupon they positively identified the suspect. The suspect was also in possession of a knife that the female half of the couple had described to the officers as being the one that the suspect had been holding when he threatened to stab them. This homeless person was arrested with bail 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.
