A Riverhead ex-con with a history of weapons and assault convictions is charged in a knife attack at a Railroad Avenue market last night.
Riverhead Police said Anthony Wayne Smith, 56, cut a 32-year-old Hispanic man across the face with a knife and harassed two other Hispanic men during the same incident last night at Mae’s Market on Railroad Avenue.
Police responding to a call at the market at 7:48 p.m. found a Hispanic man bleeding from a laceration to his face, according to a Riverhead Police press release. He reported being cut across the face by a black man armed with the knife, police said. The victim then identified the defendant, who was still present at the scene, as the man who attacked him, according to the report. Investigating officers determined that Smith had also harassed two others at the scene, police said; no further information was provided by police.
During his arrest, Smith damaged police handcuffs and a computer keyboard being used by the arresting officer, according to the press release.
Smith was arrested in May on a felony weapons charge stemming from an incident on Railroad Avenue in which he was found in possession of a gravity knife. (See prior story.)
No information about the status or disposition of that charge was immediately available.
Smith has two prior felony convictions: a weapons possession charge in 1979, for which he served 11 years in state prison; and a felony assault charge in 2002, for which he served 6 years upstate.
He was charged last night with assault in the first degree, criminal possession of a weapon in the third degree, criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree, two counts of criminal mischief in the fourth degree, obstructing governmental administration and two counts of harassment in the second degree, according to the police report.
Smith was held for morning arraignment, police said.
Editor’s note: A criminal charge is an accusation. By law, a person charged with a crime is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
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