By way of David Stamper’s Facebook update, a sad story of how ordinary attempted vehicular homicide turned into . . . a sword fight:
A hit-and-run collision Wednesday followed by a brief sword fight led police to arrest a 25-year-old man for assault.
About 4 p.m., the Sunnyside man spotted a 27-year-old rival and intentionally rammed his 1981 Ford F-150 pickup into the man’s vehicle as he backed out of his driveway in the 100 block of South 11th Street, said Charlotte Hinderlider, Sunnyside police spokeswoman.
The alleged assailant brandished a sword, swinging it at his enemy, who had climbed out of his own vehicle, Hinderlider said.
The suspect fell, giving the victim time to pick up a machete that happened to be laying in his yard and defend himself from his alleged attacker, Hinderlider said. Meanwhile, the victim’s mother, still in the vehicle, dialed 9-1-1 from her cellular phone.
You can’t really call yourself a swordsman if your intended victim can pick up a machete that “happened to be laying in his yard” and successfully defend himself. The report doesn’t spell out the actual weapon used, but it doesn’t seem to show that the attacker actually knew what the hell to do with whatever kind of sword he was using.
For those of you following along at home: you wound with the edge, but you kill with the point. The wounds may be painful, nasty, and gruesome, but if you’re trying to kill someone, the sword is a thrusting weapon, not a slashing weapon.
