{"id":94329,"date":"2019-04-26T18:35:37","date_gmt":"2019-04-27T00:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-police-identify-two-men-in-near-fatal-stabbing\/"},"modified":"2019-04-26T18:35:37","modified_gmt":"2019-04-27T00:35:37","slug":"durango-police-identify-two-men-in-near-fatal-stabbing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-police-identify-two-men-in-near-fatal-stabbing\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango police identify two men in near-fatal stabbing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Arrest
Arrest warrants were issued for two men involved in an altercation, including the victim of a stabbing.<\/span>Durango Herald file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Police have obtained arrest warrants for two men involved in a fight three weeks ago that sent one of them to the intensive-care unit for nine days.<\/p>\n

The arrest warrants were issued Thursday for Troy Brown, 30, and Chris Harper, 31, in connection with an April 1 stabbing near College Plaza. The two men have known each other for a number of years and were arguing for months leading up to the altercation, each making threats to fight, injure or kill the other, according to an arrest affidavit filed in 6th Judicial District Court.<\/p>\n

Brown, whom police suspect of third-degree assault and stalking, turned himself in Thursday, said Durango Police Department Cmdr. Rita Warfield. He was released on $5,000 bail.<\/p>\n

Harper, who told officers he will turn himself in, is suspected of first-degree assault and stalking, according to a news release from the city.<\/p>\n

The two men ran into each other by coincidence April 1 near College Plaza<\/a>. Harper was sitting in a parked truck in the 700 block of East Fifth Street when Brown approached him, according to the affidavit. Video footage from a nearby business showed Harper exit his vehicle when Brown approached.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome type of commotion seems to immediately take place at the driver\u2019s door of the truck and then appears to move toward the front of the truck and into the street,\u201d according to the affidavit. Twenty-three seconds later, Brown is seen staggering though the parking lot, clutching his side.<\/p>\n

Brown was taken to Mercy Regional Medical Center with life-threatening injuries. Police recovered a 6-inch blade from the scene.<\/p>\n

A detective interviewed Harper immediately after the incident; Brown\u2019s nine-day hospitalization kept police from contacting him<\/a>, which stalled the investigation, Warfield said.<\/p>\n

Harper told police the two had been arguing about a misunderstanding related to a job Harper had contracted Brown to do. Harper said Brown wanted to settle the disagreement with a fistfight, but Harper wanted to avoid a fight because he has a brain lesion that could prove fatal if injured.<\/p>\n

\u201cHarper explained that he is intimidated by his medical condition and would not be willing to risk his life and that he would do anything to prevent that,\u201d according to the affidavit. Harper said he grabbed the knife after Brown swung at him.<\/p>\n

Police interviewed Brown almost two weeks after the incident. He told officers he approached Harper\u2019s truck April 1 with the intent \u201cto physically confront (Harper) in order to settle their situation,\u201d according to the affidavit. He told police he expected to fight Harper but did not expect him to use a weapon. Brown said Harper exited his truck with the knife.<\/p>\n

Cellphone records reviewed by police indicate Brown and Harper had been arguing about work though text messages since Jan. 11, according to Brown\u2019s arrest affidavit. At some point in the conversation, Brown challenged Harper to fight.<\/p>\n

\u201cHarper did not back down from the challenge and invited Brown to meet him in Ignacio,\u201d police wrote in an affidavit.<\/p>\n

The two men didn\u2019t message each other again until Jan. 25, when Brown again challenged Harper to a fight. The two threatened each other throughout the conversation, and Harper \u201crepeatedly invites Brown to come confront him at his residence,\u201d police wrote. Brown refuses for fear of being shot.<\/p>\n

\u201cU can still get shot anywhere,\u201d Harper texted Brown, according to police. \u201cBut if u think ur safe from a bullet in public think again.\u201d<\/p>\n

The conversation sparked again in early March, after the two had allegedly confronted each other in the Durango Walmart parking lot. Harper texted Brown asking him why he backed down from a fight, and the two go on to threaten each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on the texting\/messaging conversations recorded on Harper\u2019s phone, it didn\u2019t appear Harper wanted to avoid a physical confrontation,\u201d police wrote. \u201cHe made multiple threats of his own and called out Brown several times, even though Brown appeared to be the prominent verbal aggressor.\u201d<\/p>\n

bhauff@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

suspects are accused of assault, stalking<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":94330,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[168],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-94329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-crime"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94329"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94329\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94329"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=94329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}