Las Vegas police said a man shot a landscaper in the head with a crossbow bolt over frustrations about his car being towed.
The Metropolitan Police Department arrested Charles Nichols on Feb. 26 at a condominium complex in the northwest Las Vegas Valley, according to his arrest report. He faces felony counts of attempted murder and battery with a deadly weapon.
Nichols told police he became irritated by the loud noises from the landscaper’s blower after retrieving his towed car that morning, but denied using a bow and arrow to scare the man away, according to the report.
The landscaper told police he was blowing dirt in the complex’s parking lot when he heard two consecutive “swishes” go by him, according to the report. When he looked around, the report said, the landscaper saw a man walk inside an upstairs condo from its balcony.
After talking to a friend for about ten minutes, the landscaper said he felt something near his right temple, according to the report.
“He touched his head and immediately recognized it was wet and began seeing blood dripping,” the report said.
The landscaper looked down and saw an arrow, the report said, which he picked up before walking away. The landscaper said he tried to clean the wound with water from his bottle, but could not stop the bleeding, according to the report.
Two people helped him get a towel to apply pressure to the wound and asked a couple walking nearby to call police, the report said.
The landscaper told police he did not see where the arrow came from and did not see or hear anyone when he was struck, but said the arrow likely came from the same balcony he saw a man standing on earlier, according to the report. He added that he did not have any issues with residents and did not know why anyone would target him, police said.
Police found two black arrows, each about five to six inches long, and one missing its tip, in the area where the landscaper was working, according to the report.
In an interview with a detective, Nichols said he believed the complex’s homeowners association sent the landscaper to bother him, according to the report.
In the ten months Nichols had been living at his mother’s residence, police said, his silver Kia Rio had twice been towed. Nichols, who told police he suffers from high anxiety, said he had picked up his car from the tow lot that morning and became extremely upset upon hearing the landscaper’s blower, the report said.
Nichols said he threw items from his junk drawer at the landscaper, police said, including a can of soup and possibly butter knives. Nichols, who has a Nevada hunting license, denied owning a bow and arrow, but said he owns darts and throwing stars, according to the report.
Officers executed a search warrant at Nichols’ residence and found a crossbow in an air conditioning vent, as well as six crossbow bolts that matched the kind shot at the landscaper, the report said.
Nichols told police he wanted the landscaper to leave the area and never intended to harm him, the report said. Nichols added he was not under the influence of narcotics and claimed to have drank only one beer when he got home, according to the report.
Contact Spencer Levering at slevering@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0253.
