Officials: Teen needed pints of blood after attack

A Pompano Beach teenager claims self-defense after being accused of stabbing a friend multiple times, prosecutors said Monday.

The injured boy was stabbed in his chest and his femoral artery was severed. He required 55 pints of blood and his heart stopped at least four times. The boy, whose identity was not released, remains hospitalized and is in intensive care, State Attorney Eric Linder said during a court hearing.

The Broward State Attorney’s Office has charged Zachary Larry Stoddard, 16, as an adult for the offenses of attempted murder and battery.

The violence happened April 27, when Stoddard was among four teens who were hanging out at a Pompano Beach home. The group decided to go out to eat, piled into a Jeep and told Stoddard he wasn’t invited.

Stoddard yelled and cursed at a girl sitting in the front passenger seat, grabbed her arms and tried to pull her out of the truck, according to an arrest report.

The Jeep’s driver got out and Stoddard stabbed him, Linder said.

“Mr. Stoddard tells the police that he was being choked by this individual and responded,” said Ashley Kay, Stoddard’s lawyer. “Without making any admissions on behalf of Mr. Stoddard of any kind, and just going through the probable cause report as it stands for the purpose only of this bond hearing, it looks like there are two different version of events by two different individuals.”

Linder disputed Stoddard’s description of what happened.

“Mr. Stoddard claims that after stabbing the victim in the chest in self-defense, he then mounted the victim,” Linder said. “He claims at this point that the victim began choking him and that’s when he stabbed him in the groin, severing his femoral artery.”

Linder said it was not logical that the teen who was stabbed and bleeding would have had the strength to choke his assailant.

The prosecutor also referred to witness statements that before Stoddard fled, he taunted the wounded teen on the ground.

“These are not the actions of someone acting in self-defense,” Linder said. “These are the actions of someone acting in rage and anger, for what he deemed a personal slight, words that were spoken against him by one of the female passengers.”

Stoddard was found at Broward Health Imperial Point Hospital in Fort Lauderdale. He was shirtless and had blood stains on his skin and clothing. When deputies patted him down they found a knife, the arrest report said.

While his parents were present, Stoddard told deputies that he never touched the girl in the front seat of the Jeep and that the other boy blindsided him, the arrest report said. Stoddard admitted stabbing the other teen multiple times and said he was acting in self-defense.

He also confirmed that the knife deputies found on him was the one used in the stabbing.

Stoddard lives with his parents and attends Andrews High School in Pompano Beach, his lawyer said.

During a court hearing Monday, Broward County Judge Jackie Powell said: “This court does have great concerns and you know, I’ll say, not just for the community as well as for Mr. Stoddard, he’s a young man. But I still at this point in time have to make a determination based on the affidavit that has been presented to me. The allegations are serious and there is great cause for concern for the community.”