Video footage captured inside a California home appears to show a pickaxe-wielding man threatening his roommate after the suspect reportedly crashed his car into a nearby residence.
The man busted through the front door of the home using his body weight, according to video shared by ABC7. He then allegedly chased one of his roommates, Eric Li, with a pickaxe from the backyard. Li was eventually able to escape and call the police, the outlet reported.
“I said, ‘Please, calm down. Tell me what happened,'” said Li, according to ABC7. “You know, he never answered, just chased me. My parents, they grow a lot of vegetables in the backyard. They have a lot of tools.”
The unnamed man also used the pickaxe to hack into another roommate’s door while the roommate screamed for help from inside the room, the outlet reported. (Woman Allegedly Runs Over Neighbor Because Of Trash Can Feud)
The suspect successfully broke through the door, video shows, but the second roommate was allegedly able to subdue him.
Witness Andy Lopez reportedly said he encountered a gardener who was attacked, as well. “We were inside working and the gardener came up panicking and said somebody was chasing him with an ax. And we came out and we heard screaming and yelling at the house, sounded like somebody was being tortured,” he told the outlet.
Deputies from the Orange County Sheriff’s Department (OCSD) arrived at the scene and managed to take the allegedly erratic man into custody, according to ABC7.
“There was some terrible yelling and screaming,” Lopez told the outlet. “And the police went in they pulled out their weapons, and we heard like five gunshots. And, apparently, I guess they used non-lethal type ammunition. When they brought the suspect out he was pretty bloody.”
Law enforcement brought the suspect to the hospital to be treated for his injuries from the initial crash before booking him into jail, the outlet reported.