Police in Florida arrested an eight-year-old boy who allegedly slashed the throat of another child and then threatened to “kill everyone,” authorities said.
The horrifying and violent incident started at around 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 11, at a home in Clermont, when the eight-year-old started fighting with a 13-year-old foster child who lived at the residence.
According to a police incident report, the young attacker, whose identity has been withheld due to his age, grabbed the older victim and started choking him, only releasing his hold when the boy complained that he could barely breathe and managed to kick him.
The victim tried to approach the eight-year-old again later and tried to talk to him, but to his shock, the young boy grabbed a knife from the kitchen and slashed at him, cutting his throat.
An adult, present at the time of the incident, managed to wrestle the knife from the eight-year-old and to hand it to a woman who was a resident at the home.
The eight-year-old then scrambled in search of the knife and was quoted as saying that he would “kill everyone.”
When he saw his search was futile, the boy allegedly got hold of a stick and tried to hit the victim with it but the other children in the home stopped him.
Adults in the home called 911, and responding officers from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office said they found the eight-year-old boy crying and that he begged them not to take him away.
The boy then allegedly kicked one of the officers and the car as they tried to handcuff him and get him in the back of the patrol car to take him to a detention center.
The 13-year-old victim’s injuries did not turn out to be serious, despite the ugly three-inch laceration on his neck, and he refused to be taken to a hospital after being examined by paramedics. Police say that he was alert and attentive as he was being interviewed.
The eight-year-old boy apparently has a history of violence and is facing several charges, including battery by strangulation and aggravated battery using a deadly weapon.
