Busy St. Patrick's Day Weekend For Police

St. Patrick’s Day revelry kept Traverse City police busy over a sunny but cold weekend.

Police were called to numerous assaults and incidents of intoxication, beginning with a fight at 4:10pm Friday near Union Street Station.

A member of a bagpiper band said he was assaulted by an acquaintance, and officers found him badly injured behind the bar, says TCPD Chief Jeff O’Brien. The 47-year-old victim was defended by his fellow bagpipers, who ganged up on his 47-year-old attacker, according to O’Brien. No one wanted to press charges, and the victim sought his own treatment.

Later, police responded to an assault on the TART Trail near Franklin Street after a homeless man picked up a homeless 34-year-old woman and threw her to the pavement, causing injuries that required hospitalization. The man fled but was tracked down nearby by an officer who arrested him and another man on unrelated warrants. The suspect, a 36-year-old Cheboygan man, is expected to be charged with assault and battery.

At 11:39pm, officers responded to Munson Medical Center where a 58-year-old woman who they’d helped get into an ambulance earlier in the evening had assaulted a nurse.

Arrests related to drunkenness continued on Saturday and Sunday, with police called to five drunkenness, disorderly or minor in possession complaints and six reports of assaults.