A 26-year-old Oak Harbor man accused of slashing another man’s throat with a broken beer bottle at a nightclub made a preliminary appearance in Island County Superior Court Thursday.
Judge Vickie Churchill found probable cause to hold Shaunyae Allen on suspicion of first-degree assault and set his bail at $150,000. She emphasized that Allen, who’s also known as “Shytown” or “Chi-town,” had been banned from going into any liquor establishments since he’s on probation.
Chief Criminal Prosecutor Eric Ohme said Allen had been released from prison Dec. 27 after serving time for second-degree assault and possession of a stolen firearm. He said that Allen could face from 10 to 13 years in prison on the new charge under the standard sentence range if convicted.
Allen’s attorney, Peter Simpson of Coupeville, unsuccessfully requested a much lower bail, pointing out that even the police report suggests his client may not have started the fight.
“It’s unclear at this point who might have been the primary aggressor,” he said. “There seems to be some confusion about that.”
Detective Tony Slowik with the Oak Harbor Police Department investigated the assault that occurred at Club Element at about 1 a.m. on Feb. 18. A witness told investigators that the fight started between Allen and another 26-year-old man after the man hugged a woman, which apparently upset Allen.
The witness said Allen grabbed the front of the other man’s shirt and the man pushed him back. The woman claimed the men started wrestling and fell to the floor; Allen was holding a bottle of Corona beer, broke the bottle on the floor and slashed the other man’s face, according to Slowik’s report.
The surveillance video from the club appears to show that the alleged victim first pushed Allen and Allen responded by pulling him forward, causing him to fall to the floor. The video appears to show Allen punching the victim while he’s down, according to the police report.
The bouncers separated the two men and escorted Allen out of the club. A witness reported that blood “squirted and gushed onto the floor” from the victim, Slowik wrote. The man, who suffered several lacerations to the throat and chin, was transported to the hospital and immediately taken into surgery. He was moved to the intensive care unit afterward and placed on a ventilator for several days, the police report states.
In an interview with detectives, the alleged victim admitted that he pushed Allen after he grabbed his shirt, but then Allen punched him. He said he didn’t even know he had been cut until he went into the bathroom.
The man said the doctors told him that one of the lacerations was about 2 centimeters from piercing his carotid artery. He received 70 stitches.
In an interview with the detective, Allen said the other man pushed him first, so he punched him one time in the head. He denied punching the man while he was on the floor and said he didn’t remember if he was holding a beer bottle, the report states.
Allen was the victim in a drive-by shooting that occurred more than a year ago, on New Year’s Eve, in Oak Harbor. The incident also started at the Element nightclub, where Allen got into an altercation with a group of women. Someone hit him over the head with a pink liquor bottle outside the club.
One of the women in the fight called her relatives, who went after Allen. One of the men shot at his car twice on NW Cathlamet.
After being shot at, Allen drove home to his apartment. He happened to see a woman, who he mistakenly thought was involved in the fight at the nightclub, standing outside a neighboring apartment building. He walked over, pointed a gun at her and uttered a threatening remark. He later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a year and five months in prison, but was apparently released early for good behavior.
