The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Police: Man stabbed victim with razor
Incident followed alleged drunken dispute
EAST HAMPTON — A man was stabbed and another arrested in an alleged drunken encounter late last month.
Details of the Sept. 29 incident, which took place shortly after 5 p.m. in the Lakeview Cemetery on Lake View Road/Route 66, became available this week.
Authorities were called about an “intoxicated and injured male” who said he had been stabbed, according to East Hampton police Sgt. Timothy Dowty. The 32-year-old alleged victim said he and the assailant were drinking vodka with a woman in a gazebo near 42 E. High St., according to the report.
The woman left to go to an appointment prior to the violence, Dowty wrote. It was then, the alleged victim said, the suspect, later identified as Fred Nichols, 58, of no certain address “came after him for no reason.”
Nichols “had some kind of razor and stabbed him in the hand,” the victim told police, who added, “getting stabbed hurt a lot and (he) was scared to get stabbed again.”
A witness saw the victim, whose “hands
were all bloody.” The witness told officers she asked the victim whether he was all right and he replied “he was dying,” at which point, the witness called 911, according to the report.
The victim was taken to Middlesex Hospital for treatment of his injuries, police said.
At the gazebo, Dowty found “multiple empty alcohol beverage containers” as well as “blood splattered all around the gazebo decking and seating area,” he wrote.
Dowty said he found Nichols a short distance away, sitting on a bench with the woman who had been drinking with him and the victim earlier in the afternoon, according to authorities.
In his version of the incident, Nichols told officers it was the other man who had instigated the incident and Nichols had stabbed the man in selfdefense. Nichols allegedly told Dowty the victim “just flipped a switch and his eyes got crazy,” and the victim told him “he was going to kill him.”
Nichols said he fought back to protect himself and eventually stabbed the victim with pocket knife. A witness interviewed by Dowty supported Nichols’ version of the incident, police said.
However, Dowty said the knife Nichols had used was “old and slightly rusted” and “was very difficult to open” and Nichols told him the victim had backed off at one point. As a result, Dowty arrested Nichols, who authorities said is homeless and has been living in a tent behind a Route 66 convenience store.
Nichols is charged with second-degree assault and second-degree breach of peace. He was released on a $25,000 bond and is due back in state Superior Court in Middletown Oct. 24.