A dispute between two men in a Pawtucket parking lot turned into a machete attack Friday that spilled out onto Pawtucket Avenue, leaving one man with a minor injury and another facing a felony charge. Police responded to the area of Pawtucket Avenue and Ann Mary Street, where officers say the confrontation began in a parking lot before moving into the roadway.
According to WJAR, police say one man threatened another with a machete before the confrontation turned physical, with the weapon ultimately being used against the second man. The victim sustained a minor injury and was treated at the scene, the station reports. A 56-year-old man was taken into custody following the assault and has been charged with felony assault and disorderly conduct, per the same report.
The Location of the Confrontation
Patch reported that Vicente's Supermarket planned a location at 470 Pawtucket Avenue, while the store at 50 Ann Mary Street was Ocean State Job Lot, according to Patch. Police said the confrontation began in a parking lot before moving into the roadway Friday evening or night.
Part of a Wider Pattern of Edged-Weapon Violence
A separate machete assault in Fall River left a 35-year-old man hospitalized with head injuries following a confrontation near Brayton Avenue on October 15. The incident occurred one day before the Pawtucket case.
Machete-related incidents have surfaced repeatedly across the area in recent years. In May, two students were taken into custody after a handgun and a machete were recovered. And in October 2023, a 70-year-old Providence tenant was accused of striking his landlord in the face with a machete during a dispute over rent, leaving the victim needing 15 facial stitches, according to WJAR.
A City Already Under Scrutiny for Violent Crime
The Friday altercation follows a string of serious violent crime cases in Pawtucket. Just over a week earlier, Pawtucket Police executed search warrants and arrested two 21-year-old men on attempted murder charges tied to a September shooting on Mineral Spring Avenue that wounded a man in the chest, deploying special response and major crime units to make the arrests. Hoodline covered that case in a report on the Mineral Spring Avenue shooting, which also noted that Rhode Island Department of Health public safety data ranks Pawtucket alongside Central Falls, Providence, and Woonsocket among the state's highest violent-crime municipalities.
It remains unclear whether Friday's machete suspect and victim knew each other prior to the parking-lot confrontation, or what specific bail terms were set at his initial court appearance.
