Rio Linda man gets six months in jail for assault

Nathan W. Tunstall also sentenced for felony vandalism on Aug. 15

A Solano County Superior Court judge on Friday sentenced a 23-year-old Rio Linda man to six months in Solano County Jail for an August assault in Vacaville.

Nathan W. Tunstall, who during a Sept. 1 proceeding changed his not-guilty plea to guilty, appeared in the Justice Center in Fairfield, where Judge Carlos R. Gutierrez sentenced him for felony assault and felony vandalism for an Aug. 15 attack in a strip mall parking lot.

In a text message, his defense attorney, Vincent Maher, confirmed details about the sentencing.

Vacaville police records indicate dispatchers received a report at about 7:30 p.m. of a person with a stab wound to the head in a strip mall parking lot in the 200 block of Nut Tree Parkway.

Upon arrival, officers found the victim, believed to be in his 20s, with “a laceration on the top of his head,” Sgt. Frank Piro told The Reporter, adding that the injury was not lifethreatening.

The victim told officers that he and a woman were driving in the area when they heard a woman scream from somewhere in the parking lot.

They reportedly saw a man and woman “in some type of altercation” and, at some point, the victim attempted to intervene out of fear for the woman’s safety, added Piro.

That’s when the Tunstall threatened the victim and the threat apparently turned physical.

Tunstall struck the victim with an unknown object, causing the cut, Piro said, and Tunstall and the woman he was arguing with fled in a vehicle. Officers, though, were able to obtain the license plate number.

The suspect vehicle was found later in the 500 block of Markham Avenue.

Tunstall was arrested and booked into Solano County Jail, without bail, on suspicion of domestic battery, assault with a deadly weapon, assault with a deadly weapon possibly causing great bodily injury, making terrorist threats and vandalism. He was also booked on a probation violation.

The Solano County District Attorney’s Office filed a complaint in the case on Aug. 18.