A Washington man tried to attack an Applebee’s bartender with a meat cleaver after he was asked to show proof of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to charging documents.
Michael Dousa, 58, started calling the bartender a “punk a– b–ch” when he refused to serve him at the restaurant chain’s Bellevue branch without proof he’d been jabbed, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Dousa walked outside — just to start “waving what looked like a meat cleaver,” responding Bellevue officer Ian Sauve wrote.
The bartender said he went out to warn the cleaver-swinging man that they would call the police if he did not leave.
Instead, the attacker came at him “and raised the cleaver over his head,” the worker told police on Feb. 5, according to the affidavit.
According to police, Dousa initiated the attack after he was asked to prove he was vaccinated against COVID-19. KOMO NewsThe bartender told cops that the alleged would-be attacker “started [to] swing the cleaver at him” — and he only avoided getting hit because he managed to get inside and close the door in time, the document said.
Dousa fled, but was tracked down with the help of a police K9 unit, the documents said. Officers found a large knife and a meat cleaver abandoned close to the restaurant, noted the papers, which included a photo of the weapons.
Dousa immediately admitted the incident — telling cops at the scene, “I waved the meat cleaver at the b–ch to egg them on, I didn’t do anything wrong,” the police report said.
The bartender said he went out to warn the cleaver-wielding man that they would call the police if he did not leave. KOMO NewsDousa was charged with second-degree assault and held in King County jail on $75,000 bail. He was already facing previous charges of third- and fourth-degree assault in a case from last summer, prosecutors noted.
The alleged attack came just two weeks after a woman was accused of pulling a handgun on a Bellevue gas station employee who threw her out for not wearing a mask, KOMO News noted.
Angela Nommensen, 33, on Monday pleaded not guilty to felony harassment over the caught-on-camera incident, the outlet said.
The attack on the bartender comes days after a gas station employee was attacked for asking a woman to wear a mask. KOMO NewsKing County prosecutor’s office spokesman Casey McNerthney speculated that the uptick in such attacks could be a sign of frustration at ongoing coronavirus restrictions.
“Either way, when you pull a meat cleaver on somebody, when you pull a gun at a gas station … you’re going to get charged for it,” McNerthney told KOMO News.
