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A 14-year-old girl was stabbed while watching her brother’s baseball game in Indiana on Saturday afternoon.
Dimas Gabriel Yanez, a 26-year-old from Honduras, allegedly used a “butcher-style knife” to randomly attack the young girl before trying to also stab her mother in a baseball field in Lowell, Lake County Sheriff’s Department said.
“He just jumped on her and pushed her over,” Mathew Raiman, coach of the baseball team, told ABC7.
“Then he proceeded to pull out what I called like a bowie knife, a big 16, 18-inch knife and just started swinging it on her.”
Raiman said that dads at the baseball game chased the suspect into a wooded area behind Oak Valley Drive before they lost sight of him.
The teenage victim, who has not been named, was taken to hospital for treatment for a stab wound to her hand. She has since been discharged.
An extensive manhunt was launched to track down the suspect, involving Lake County Sheriff’s Department K-9 and Aviation Units, detectives and patrol officers, with authorities describing him as “armed and dangerous” and warning the public not to approach.
Lake County Sheriff’s Department said that Yanez was apprehended on Sunday afternoon after he was spotted in the southern part of Lake County running through a cornfield that morning.
He had tried to throw off authorities by trying to cut his hair to change his appearance, officials said.
The motive for the attack remains unclear.
Yanez had been deported to Honduras back in 2018, the sheriff’s office said, and “may have been engaged in criminal activity across the United States since returning to the country illegally.”
The US Department of Homeland Security was now been notified of his arrest .
Sheriff Oscar Martinez Jr said: “I would like to extend my most heartfelt gratitude to each and every Lake County police officer and to all law enforcement agencies working tirelessly on the investigation and search in this case.
“I am proud of the level of cooperation exhibited by police officers throughout the county. I would also like to thank the public for sharing information in a responsible manner and for assisting us with good tips the officers could use. The investigation is still ongoing and we will provide more details as they become available.”
Yanez is now being held in Lake County Jail.
