Police are looking for a 16-year-old San Jose resident after he
allegedly threatened another man with a butcher knife at the Murphy
Ranch Apartments on East Dunne Avenue Monday afternoon.
MORGAN HILL
Police are looking for a 16-year-old San Jose resident after he allegedly threatened another man with a butcher knife at the Murphy Ranch Apartments on East Dunne Avenue Monday afternoon.
The 19-year-old man who was threatened is dating a 17-year-old girl who is the former girlfriend of the suspect, according to Morgan Hill police Cmdr. David Swing. He said the girl and the suspect had dated for a couple of years, and when she talked about breaking up, the suspect had allegedly threatened her, telling her she better not end the relationship, or he would have someone come over and beat her up.
Lately, Swing said, the couple had drifted apart, not seeing each other much, but mostly just talking on the phone. The girl began dating the 19-year-old and felt comfortable in ending her relationship with the suspect. But when she did so over the phone, Swing said, the suspect showed up at her apartment and began banging on the door and yelling for her to open up.
The girl was at home with her two siblings, a 6-year-old and an 8-year-old, and the new boyfriend. When it became clear the suspect wasn’t going to go away, the girl, the two children and the boyfriend left the apartment by a back entrance, climbed over a fence and went to the boyfriend’s apartment.
Swing said the suspect either saw them go or figured out where they had gone, and he threw a rock through a bedroom window of the 19-year-old’s apartment. The two children were hiding in the bedroom and were showered with shards of glass from the window, but were not seriously injured, Swing said.
After the suspect threw the rock, it was quiet outside, and the girl and her new boyfriend believed the suspect had left. But when the 19-year-old left the apartment, he was charged by the suspect, who was wielding a butcher knife. He was intercepted by some neighbors before he could strike his former girlfriend’s new boyfriend, and he ran away. Police were called, but the suspect had already fled.
At some point, Swing said, the suspect must have entered one of the apartments and taken the knife.
One of the witnesses told police the suspect may have had a gun in the waistband of his pants.
Morgan Hill officers contacted San Jose police, but they were unable to locate the suspect, who is on juvenile probation, at several different addresses, Swing said. Police are working with the probation department to find the teen.
When he is found, Swing said, he will be arrested for assault with a deadly weapon, and they may be other charges, such as burglary and child endangerment.
