A woman said it all began after Ricardo Burnett called her an expletive when she didn’t thank him for opening the door at a Flying J Travel Center Denny’s on Ripley Street in Lake Station.
They argued. Her 23-year-old boyfriend tried to step in.
There was a “scuffle.”
Burnett, 48, a trucker from Deer Park, New York, and Florida, pulled out a pocket knife and stabbed him at least eight times in the chest, abdomen and arms, records allege.
He told the cops it was “self-defense.”
Burnett was charged Saturday with attempted murder, aggravated battery and battery by means of a deadly weapon. Court filings show he is in custody. A court hearing was scheduled Monday.
His next hearing is July 2.
Lake Station cops responded just after 9 p.m. June 21 to the Flying J Travel Center, 1401 Ripley St. Burnett was handcuffed and put into a police car.
Witnesses said it happened by the back door. The victim was lying on the ground on a walkway outside where a security guard was trying to tend to his wounds. Cops called paramedics.
Earlier, a janitor and the security guard were able to restrain Burnett and take the knife before the cops came.
The victim was transported to St. Mary’s Medical Center in Hobart, then airlifted to another hospital. At St. Mary’s, he was intubated and too badly hurt to talk to the cops. His condition was not immediately known.
His girlfriend, from Florida, said she was in Northwest Indiana for work in trucking and the couple took an Uber to Denny’s.
Burnett was a complete stranger.
“You don’t have to hold the door,” she responded to him.
“OK, (expletive),” Burnett responded, pushing her face away.
Burnett left and the woman browsed inside. When he returned, the two men started arguing.
“Who you talking to her like that,” the boyfriend said to Burnett.
They started fighting. She tried to separate them, then security intervened.
“He has a knife, stop,” she said.
During a police interview, Burnett said he was refueling as he headed through Indiana.
“Wow, can’t even say thank you,” Burnett said to the woman.
“Aww, whatcha gonna do,” an uninvolved man standing nearby said.
“Aww, you little (expletive),” Burnett said he responded toward the woman before he went back to the pump to double-check the number to buy gas.
“Hey, don’t you ever call me out of my name,” the woman said to him, according to Burnett as he walked back to the station.
The woman insulted his family, they started arguing and another man separated them. The woman “‘stuck’ him in the face,” Burnett said. He pushed her back and she started punching and kicking him, he told investigators.
Burnett said the woman reached into her pants at some point. Burnett pulled out a pocket knife, opening the blade, before he went inside the station.
He saw the boyfriend walk over: “Who, who, who?”
“That one,” the woman pointed to Burnett.
Burnett told investigators the boyfriend sucker-punched him, they both went down, then started fighting. The security guard broke it up. When asked if he stabbed the victim, Burnett said he didn’t know. He was still holding the knife, but trying to get the boyfriend off him by “swinging” at him.
The woman’s “attitude was off” and she was being an “(expletive),” he said.
He later clarified he didn’t remember if he opened the blade.
mcolias@post-trib.com
