ANOTHER CATCH AND RELEASE FAILURE: In Democrat-run Charlotte, a suspect was released from jail. Just FIVE DAYS LATER, police say he attacked TWO WOMEN.
One of those women, Sandy Stirrup, had stopped at the Circle K to throw away trash. She told WBTV she barely looked at the man before he struck her, knocking her backward into a pole and leaving her with a forehead wound that reportedly required stitches.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police identified the suspect as 32-year-old Evin Curtis Sims of Matthews. The alleged attack happened around 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 27, in the 1200 block of East Boulevard in Dilworth, near Kenilworth Avenue.
According to Queen City News, Sims grabbed an orange traffic cone and hit one woman in the back before striking Stirrup in the head. Firefighters treated Stirrup’s cut at the scene.
“There was nothing, no words exchanged,” Stirrup said. “He tossed the traffic cone at my head.”
An affidavit says she fell backward and struck her head on a pole. Hoodline reported scrapes on her face and body from the fall, and Stirrup described an injury to her knee.⠀
“I also got like my knee busted up and it almost knocked me out,” she told WBTV. The victims told police the attacker fled and “ran strangely,” while surveillance video supported their account that the attack was unprovoked.⠀
Another woman reported a threatening encounter that same Sunday while walking her dog in the 600 block of Queens Road. According to an affidavit, she said hello to a man, who responded, “I am going to beat you.”
The affidavit also quotes him saying, “I am going to punch you.” The woman crossed the street and took a photograph from a distance, giving detectives an image they used to connect Sims to the Circle K incident.
Officers arrested Sims on Thursday, Oct. 1. He faces two counts of as*ault on a female in the Circle K case and one count of communicating threats in the Queens Road case. All three charges are misdemeanors.
At the time of those alleged incidents, Sims was already on pretrial release following a Sept. 19 arrest at the CATS Tyvola light rail station. Police say he threatened people on a train, threw an unknown substance on children and had no fare.
During that earlier encounter, Sims told officers he couldn’t remember where he was or what had happened. He did tell them he had picked up a rock “for his safety.” He was released from jail on Sept. 22.
For Stirrup, the consequences extend beyond her physical injuries. “I’m traumatized, not well, but I’ll get through it,” she said.
“It could have been a g*n,” she told WBTV. “I could be de*d, so I’m just grateful that it wasn’t anything worse.”
She said she wanted to speak up because of the risk to another person: “If I didn’t stand up for what happened to me, then he can do it to someone else.”
#Charlotte #CMPD