Handyman gets stabbed in hand

A handyman says he was stabbed in the hand by a jealous ex-boyfriend who erupted into a rage when he found him in his former girlfriend’s bedroom.

‘He had intentions on killing me,’ testified the victim, Wayne McBride, recalling the knife attack which happened as he was doing carpentry work in a bedroom at the home of his assailant’s ex-girlfriend. ‘He stuck his knife straight in my hand.’

The defendant, Robert Popplewell, was bound to the grand jury by General Sessions Judge Larry Ross following the preliminary hearing on aggravated assault charges.

During his testimony, McBride said he could hear Popplewell heading to the bedroom where he was working, the woman urging him to ‘stop’ and to leave the house. Once in the bedroom, McBride said Popplewell charged him with a knife, his first thrust penetrating his hand.

‘The blade almost cut off my thumb,’ McBride recalled, noting they then fell to the ground where McBride fell on a drawer below him, the fall breaking three ribs. ‘I tried to hold on to the blade of the knife but something happened and I lost my grip and it slid from my hands. Then he started stabbing into my chest.’

McBride said his hand required numerous stitches while the chest wounds ended up being noncritical since his breast bone had stopped the thrusts.

While saying he was simply doing carpentry work at the woman’s house, McBride confirmed on cross examination by the defense that he had once dated the woman for whom he was working, the same woman who was Popplewell’s ex-girlfriend.

The woman, Sheila Thomas, confirmed McBride’s story as to Popplewell bursting into her house in a jealous rage.

However, Thomas, who was not in the courtroom when McBride testified, said it was McBride who threw the first punch.

‘I think Wayne planned to get in the first punch,’ Thomas said of McBride, noting she thinks he slugged Popplewell when he stepped into the bedroom.

Thomas said she did not realize a knife had been pulled during the fight, but it was obvious someone had been stabbed.

‘There was blood everywhere,’ Thomas testified, noting she did not know who the blood belonged to at first.

Popplewell remains held awaiting his case to go before the grand jury.