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From the Police Blotter: A Machete/Crossbow Confrontation
From Q13 Fox News:
BELLINGHAM, Wash. — A Bellingham Police officer and a Whatcom County Sheriff’s deputy shot a California man who fired a crossbow at them near Arroyo Park Sunday.
According to a news release from Bellingham PD, Bellingham officers responded to Arroyo Park, where people reported a man threatening them with a machete.
Officers arrived to investigate and called for a Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office K-9 to assist. As officers and the K-9 approached the suspect, police said he fired a crossbow directly at them.
A Bellingham officer and a Whatcom deputy returned fire, striking the suspect.
The suspect is a 46-year-old California man who was treated at the scene and then taken to a local hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Although police released his name, Q13 does not typically name suspects until they are formally charged with a crime. No residents or officers were injured during the exchange.
The officers involved in the shooting have been re-assigned per each agency’s policy.
After he is released from the hospital, the suspect will be booked into the Whatcom County Jail on charges of felony harassment and attempted murder. Police say the suspect has a criminal history in California.
The suspect was rather upset with officers and used some foul language to express his displeasure at being shot as he was loaded into the ambulance.
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Published in Law
I’m sure that never happened to you, Doug.
Nunchucks, assorted firearms, knives, and foul language was as exotic as it got for me.
Brought a crossbow to a gunfight.
And then missed.
When I was a cardiac surgery resident,. I treated a crossbow case. The patient was a rental manager in an apartment house and it was a rent dispute. Good Samaritan hospital did not have an ER at the time but she had had surgery by one of our older surgeons so she insisted the ambulance brought her there. When seen she had a crossbow “bolt” right through her heart. We took her to surgery and removed the bolt . Crossbow bolts have a spring like metal barb that prevents them being removed. We had to open her chest with a midline sternotomy. The bolt went right through her heart but the holes it made were plugged by the shaft. The head of the bolt was through the diaphragm into a hepatic vein. We cut the bolt, which was wood except for the tip, and pulled it back out of each chamber of the heart, sewing up the hole as we pulled it out. If it had been a gunshot wound she would have been dead to the spot.
Devil’s advocate: Excessive use of force.
Unless he had the machete in his hand, he was effectively disarmed once he shot his bolt.
Should have let the K-9 take him down.
Expandable broadheads aren’t legal everywhere.
Of course, neither is shooting someone in the chest with one.
Disagree. He has attempted harm. You do not know what other weapons he could have on him. Take him down from as far away as possible and with extreme prejudice.
In heavy brush like that, they would have had a hard time knowing just what he had.
Firing the crossbow sure as hell announced his intent, though.
Also, could they see for certain what sort of crossbow it was? There are automatic and semi-automatic crossbows. (I know that sounds weird, but it’s true.)
That’s it. Assault Crossbows must be outlawed!
Or not.
This was not a “broadhead,” like a a hunting arrow. Crossbow bolts are not the same. The Russell Crowe movie, “Robin Hood”, has a good depiction of a crossbow wound.
You can’t fire a crossbow! You can only shoot a crossbow.
If someone shoots a crossbow at you, it’s a good idea to fire your gun back at him.
You can, but it tends to destroy any wooden or plastic parts.