- April 24, 2024
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Deputies arrived at a Bunnell home to find a man screaming that he'd been stabbed, blood running from a wound in his arm. They arrested the man, 27-year-old Earnest Eugene Thomas, after determining that his wife had stabbed him in self-defense.
Flagler County Sheriff's Office deputies were dispatched at about 1:49 p.m. Jan. 24 to check on a domestic disturbance at the home on Cheryl Elaine Drive, in Bunnell near the Bull Creek Fish Camp, according to a Sheriff's Office arrest report.
When they arrived, a deputy wrote in the report, "the front porch area had blood spatter in the area immediately in front of the front door. The front door itself had blood spatter running down the outside of the door."
Inside, they found Thomas yelling, "Help me, help me, I’ve been stabbed!" Blood soaked a bandage across his right arm. The floor was bloodied and marked by footprints.
A deputy placed a tourniquet on Thomas' arm, and rescuers took Thomas to a designated helicopter landing zone so the county's emergency services helicopter could take Thomas to Halifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach.
Thomas told deputies he'd fought with his wife, and she'd stabbed him. He admitted to slapping her and threatening her with a pocket knife.
But she "grabbed the knife and stabbed him in the arm before running from the house naked to a neighbor’s residence," taking three children — her 8-year-old son, 4-year-old daughter and 1-year-old grandson — with her, according to the deputy's report.
Deputies retrieved the blood-covered knife, which had a 4-inch blade, and also took Thomas' cell phone and a pair of blood-soaked jean shorts as evidence.
Deputies notified the Department of Children and Families that three children had been in the home during the attack.
They charged Thomas with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, false imprisonment, domestic battery by strangulation and tampering with a witness. All are felonies. He remained at the county jail as of Jan. 26.
Thomas had also been charged with misdemeanor battery domestic violence in September 2016 after the same woman, who at the time told deputies that Thomas was her boyfriend of six years, told deputies he'd struck her. That charge was later dropped, according to court records.
