Charlottesville Police are asking for assistance in its investigation of a stabbing that they say occurred “in or around” Market Street Park early Sunday morning.
But more than five people who sleep in the park told The Daily Progress they had not heard or seen anything that would indicate someone was stabbed in the area.
“Nobody here got stabbed. Nobody here stabbed anyone,” Roscoe Boxley told The Daily Progress. “Whatever incident happened was happening somewhere down the street on the other side of The Haven. It had nothing to do with the park.”
Boxley was not in the park on Sunday morning when the alleged crime took place between 1:30 and 3:30 a.m.
But multiple people who were there at the time said that while they often hear noises at night, they did not hear anyone screaming and did not see any blood.
In a Wednesday press release, police say officers were dispatched to UVa Medical Center after a report of a victim “who had suffered several stab wounds.”
A person at the UVa Medical Center would not divulge to The Daily Progress whether anyone was admitted to the hospital with stab wounds on Sunday.
According to the press release, the stabbing occurred “in or around Market Street Park.”
At a Thursday press conference, police chief Michael Kochis explained that was the location given by the victim.
“When we went to the hospital that’s what we were told from the person because he was kind of out of it,” Kochis said, adding that police do not know exactly where the incident occurred.
“That’s why we’re asking the public who was there, just like we would if there was a stabbing in Belmont on West Haven,” Kochis said.
Police wrote in the press release that the unnamed victim is in stable condition and that they do not believe the attack was “random.”
A security camera attached to a light pole at the intersection of 2nd Street and East Market Street may help authorities learn more.
“This park has been raided multiple times for less,” Boxley said, noting that no police raid occurred after the reported stabbing. He went as far as to call allegations of a stabbing at the park a “total lie.”
Market Street Park has become the center of controversy for the city’s homelessness crisis after City Manager Sam Sanders’ recent decision to lift the curfew at the park, thus allowing people to spend the night there.
Multiple tents have been erected in the park by homeless people since the decision.
Sanders made the move after hearing allegations that police kicked a sleeping homeless man while enforcing the curfew.
Police have asked anyone with information about the stabbing to contact the Crime Stoppers Tip Line at (434) 977-4000.
Source: www.dailyprogress.com
Be First to Comment