In what was the third case in two weeks involving a knife,
Morgan Hill Police are still looking for both the victim and the
suspect. According to MHPD Lt. Joe Sampson, an apparent assault
with a knife ended in the arguing couple fleeing before officers
arrived at the residence.
In what was the third case in two weeks involving a knife, Morgan Hill Police are still looking for both the victim and the suspect. According to MHPD Lt. Joe Sampson, an apparent assault with a knife ended in the arguing couple fleeing before officers arrived at the residence.
On Sept. 7, a dispute between a couple ended when the male allegedly held two kitchen knives to the throat of his girlfriend; a friend of the couple intervened, and the male was arrested.
On Sept. 6, a 43-year-old mother was arrested after she allegedly assaulted her sons with a pool cue, a hatchet and a knife.
In the latest case, dispatchers received a 911 call at 5:20am Wednesday morning from a 25-year-old Morgan Hill woman in a Barnell Avenue apartment. The woman told dispatchers there was an argument between her and her live-in boyfriend, a 31-year-old man.
While on the phone with the woman, the dispatcher could hear arguing back and forth, Sampson said, and then heard the mention of a knife. At that point, the phone was hung up. When the dispatcher called back, the female said a child had been playing with the phone, and the call was a mistake.
Based on what the dispatcher overheard and the woman’s response on the callback, officers responded, and when no one answered the door at the apartment, they forced the door open.
Officers found a male friend of the couple, who said he was visiting for the week, in one of the bedrooms. He said he was not aware of any argument and told police he is a heavy sleeper.
There were no children in the home at the time, although the woman has two children who were apparently staying with other family members.
As officers searched the apartment, they realized the couple had left. They did find, however, blood on the floor in the master bedroom and on the walls in the hallway near the bedroom.
“This was not a pool of blood,” said Sampson. “Just some drops on the floor and some smears and spatters on the wall. It did not appear to be a quantity of blood that would have led us to believe anyone had suffered grave injury.”
Detectives were called to the scene, and the search continued. A variety of knives were found in the apartment, Sampson said, and one of them, shaped like a paring knife but believed to be from a tattoo kit, was found with blood on it.
The detectives tried to locate the couple by calling area hospitals, to see if anyone with possible knife injuries had been treated that morning. There were no reports that matched the facts of the case.
Later in the day, the woman contacted family members, according to Sampson, and told them she and her boyfriend were both okay but would not say where they were.
“It turns out each of them had arrest warrants, and they were concerned if their whereabouts were discovered, they would be arrested,” Sampson said. “When they are located, they will be brought in for interviews, and we will try to determine the nature of this incident that happened Wednesday, whether there is any criminal culpability, what the circumstances were. Secondarily, the issue of the warrants will be dealt with.”
Sampson said the couple is likely traveling in a 1984 Mazda SR4 gray pickup, license number 2H88532. Anyone with information concerning the couple is asked to call 779-2101 or to report anonymously, 778-STOP.
Sampson said he does not have a theory about why the domestic violence incident, normally rare in Morgan Hill, occurred so close together.
“I don’t think there’s any rhyme or reason to it,” he said. “All cities go through phases with different types of crimes that go on. Let’s just hope that we’re at the end of our phase of these domestic-with-weapon-type incidents.”
