BIG PINE KEY, Fla. – A 40-year-old man from Big Pine Key was arrested this week after he threatened another man with a machete over a racial joke he didn’t find funny, authorities said.
According to Monroe County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Adam Linhardt, the 52-year-old victim told deputies that the suspect, Joshua Aaron Herald, is a friend of a friend who he was helping with some construction work and painting inside a home Wednesday in the 31000 block of Avenue D on Big Pine Key.
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“The victim asked Herald if he measured before he went to cut something. Herald stated he had,” Linhardt said in an email. “The victim stated one must always measure twice and cut once when working with white people, adding it was an expression among Spanish speakers.”
But the victim told deputies that Herald became enraged over the joke and began yelling profanities at him, despite him trying to apologize for offending him.
Linhardt said Herald eventually grabbed a machete from his truck and threatened the victim with it.
He said witnesses corroborated the victim’s story.
Herald was arrested on a charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
The victim was not injured during the incident.