Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

Florida holds man in Arkansas attack

- EMMA PETTIT

A man accused of putting a knife to the throat of one canoeist and slashing the arm of another near an Arkansas campground this month was booked into a Florida jail on Tuesday, according to online records.

Michael Leon Wa r - rington, 49, of Chipley, Fla., was booked into the Collier County jail on a warrant from another Florida county for failure to pay child support, according to the jail’s online intake record.

He also was arrested on an Arkansas second-degree battery warrant, stemming from a July 3 altercatio­n at the Mulberry River north of Ozark in Franklin County.

A man and a woman were floating in a canoe near the Redding Recreation Area and Campground when they pulled off at Huggins Loop to visit with a man later identified as Warrington, Sgt. Jeff Wood wrote in an arrest affidavit.

The pair chatted with Warrington and drank beer for about an hour, the document says. Warrington told them he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder after serving in the Navy.

The man shook Warrington’s hand and thanked him for his service before he started to walk away, Wood wrote. As the man turned, Warrington struck him in the head with a “large knife or machete,” the victim told investigat­ors.

Warrington then grabbed the woman, put a knife to her throat and said he “had all he wanted,” the affidavit says. He started to drag her toward his truck, then shoved her aside and slashed the man’s arm, the victim said.

The man got Warrington to the ground and the knife away from him before the man and woman fled and met police at the campground, the document says.

The man said he was then airlifted to Washington Regional Medical Center, Wood wrote.

A warrant for Warrington’s arrest was issued Tuesday, according to online court records.

Warrington is being held at the Florida jail in lieu of a $6,146.78 bond.

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