Terra Ceia man stabbed while mowing the lawn. The counterattack was fatal, cops say
One person is dead and another is injured after an attacker stabbed a man riding his lawnmower in a Terra Ceia neighborhood Friday afternoon, according to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.
After receiving reports of a shirtless man wandering the area with a knife, deputies responded to the 700 block of Bayshore Drive around 12:45 p.m., the sheriff’s office said in a press release. When they arrived, they learned that a 63-year-old man had been stabbed while riding his lawnmower.
Before the attack, the sheriff’s office said the man had entered a neighbor’s home without permission and was immediately ordered to leave. Deputies say the man was described as a “suspicious person” who “was not making sense.”
After leaving the home he entered, the attacker wandered into the yard of a neighbor and attacked a man while he mowed his lawn, investigators say. According to the sheriff’s office, the attacker began to fight the 63-year-old, stabbing him multiple times.
The 63-year-old’s son heard the commotion and rode over in another lawnmower, knocking over the attacker and helping his father pin him down until deputies could arrive.
During the fight, the attacker, whose name and age were unknown and not released by law enforcement, sustained a “substantial head injury,” the sheriff’s office said. Despite life-saving efforts, the man died at the scene.
Detectives on Saturday, positively identified the suspect in Friday’s aggravated battery as 34-year-old Rodolfo Cervantes-Lara.
An autopsy will be performed within the next few days to determine how Cervantes-Lara died.
It’s still unknown why the suspect was in that area or why he attacked the victim, the sheriff’s office said.
The case is still under investigation.
The 63-year-old victim was taken to Bayfront Hospital in St. Petersburg as a trauma alert. He is expected to recover from his injuries.
The two lawnmowers remained parked in the yard near the front porch of the home around 3:45 p.m. At least nine sheriff’s office vehicles responded to the scene, including the Crime Scene Unit, which took detailed photographs of the lawnmower.
The attacker’s body lay near one of the lawnmowers, draped with a white sheet. Four deputies stood near the sheet as they talked and conducted their investigation into the incident.
Speaking with the Bradenton Herald, one neighbor said they drove their golf cart past the crime scene around 12:30 p.m., just as an ambulance arrived. At that time, a young man stood over a body in the yard, according to the neighbor.
The sheriff’s office said they found what appeared to be drugs in the attacker’s pocket.
This story was originally published July 9, 2021 at 5:35 PM.
