A Bucoda man has been accused of assaulting another man with a tire iron.
Lance Casto appeared Monday in Thurston County Superior Court and faces a charge of second-degree assault. Bail was set at $25,000, and his arraignment was scheduled for Jan. 6.
About 2:30 p.m. Dec. 19, Thurston County Sheriff’s Office deputies responded to a report of an assault that occurred behind Liberty Market at 110 Main St. in Bucoda. According to court documents, the victim was hit over the head with a tire iron before the suspect fled the scene.
Court documents give this account:
The victim had been working on a trailer outside with a friend when the suspect drove up in his truck, rolled down his window and began yelling profanities. The confrontation continued when the suspect got out of his truck. After struggling over the tire iron the two men had been using, the suspect then struck the victim over the head. The victim suffered a laceration on his head but declined to go to a hospital.
Casto told detectives he had been drinking at Joe’s Place in Bucoda to celebrate his birthday and had left to go pick up his kids from school when he drove through an alley, saw the two men tearing apart the trailer and confronted them.
The incident occurred out of self-defense, Casto said, and he grabbed the tire iron after the man had attempted to hit him with it. After striking the man in the head, Casto said he took off with the tire iron and threw it out the window on his way home. Detectives recovered the tire iron.
Casto told detectives he hadn’t planned on hitting the man with the tire iron, but that he was sick of what “those two tweekers” were doing to Bucoda and its residents. Casto also believed the males were responsible for stealing his daughter’s bike a couple of years ago.
Casto was arrested and booked into Thurston County Jail. At Monday’s court hearing, Judge Anne Hirsch set bail higher than the prosecutor’s recommended amount of $10,000. Casto told the court he was employed with the Yelm fire department, also known as the Southeast Thurston Fire Authority.
