Recently there was a rash of crimes involving a sword instead of the more traditional firearm – or maybe there was a rash of media fascination with pointy-thing-related crimes. It might also just be a rash.
Getting It All Sworded Out
It’s a familiar story: boy meets girl, girl tells him to leave, boy goes after girl with a sword. A guy in Salt Lake County, Utah unsheathed a sword at his woman, who in turn picked up a bat. She’d told him to move out and left, but when she came back he was drunk and punched her several times.
The only image Google could come up with for “sword” and “bat.”
That’s when she picked up the bat, he picked up the sword, she picked up the phone to call the police, and the police picked him up out of his backyard where he’d been hiding.
Remember that, kids: drunken people suck at hiding from the cops.
Sorry, I Meth-ed Up
Elsewhere in Salt Lake, a man was asked to leave a residence because he was smoking methamphetamine. He plucked a large, blunt sword from a neighbor's garden and threatened to kill the group of people who’d asked him to leave.
Sword fern? Seriously, who the hell is in charge of the clip art around here?
It isn’t known how the sword got in the garden or how the man knew it was there. Local horticulturists were of no help and further wanted to know why meth-head didn’t opt for the equally lethal throwing of a gnome or the less lethal but still newspaper-worthy flinging of stinging nettle.
I’d Like to Buy the World Some Coke
In Kirkcaldy, United Kingdom, Andrew Smith and James Crawford used a samurai sword and a telescopic baton to kill Alan Cruikshank in his bed. Smith owed Mr. Cruikshank a lot of money for drugs Cruikshank had given him to sell to others.
Different kind of powder.
Actual quote from Smith: “Can I plead insanity because I was a bit out of my face at the time with coke?" Smith has been jailed for life.
Trying to Get a Foothold
Elsewhere in the United Kingdom, Rodney Barnes donned a helmet before using a samurai-type sword to stab his neighbor in the foot. The neighbor had returned from a wedding when Barnes asked him if his car was an illegal taxi. After he was told it wasn’t, Barnes took off the helmet and attacked his neighbor.
Article comments
1 - Dr Dreadful
Nice, wry, funny roundup, Diane. Enjoy the peace while it lasts - the gun nuts will no doubt be along shortly.
Although I did notice that a lot of the incidents you bring to our attention here come from the UK, where moves are afoot to ban a large variety of knives and other sharp things, in reaction to such assaults as these.
Taking these legal efforts to their logical extreme, the day may come when only puréed food can be sold and served in Britain because someone ran amok with a sharpened dinner knife.
2 - NancyGail
Hoisted on their own petards! LOL
3 - Cannonshop
Swords generally work better when you put an edge on them, but violent asshats will be violent asshats with whatever instrument happens to be available.
Still, I like the college student taking out the burglar.
4 - Joanne Huspek
Someone stole our swords. It's okay. My husband bought a gun.