A 24-year-old Indiana man has been charged with stabbing a man in the back during a fight with two New York Knicks fans in a fight at a Carmel, Indiana brewery during a playoff game between the Knicks and Pacers.
Per court documents cited by local media, 24-year-old Jarrett Funke of Carmel is charged with three felony counts from the incident. Carmel is a suburb of Indianapolis.
Per the report, police were initially called to the brewery because of an argument involving Funke during the broadcast of Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals on Friday that the Pacers won, 114-109. One of the victims told police that Funke had “smacked” a Knicks hat off of one of their heads.
Funke yelled “f*** you, you still have a f***ing problem, take this outside,” to the two men, according to one of the victims.
Funke’s father intervened and pulled Funke away in an effort to de-escalate the situation, according to the Indianapolis Star. Funke and his family reportedly left the brewery after being told to leave, and the caller told police that they were no longer needed.
A brewery employee called the police back minutes later and told them that Funke had returned to the establishment’s patio and confronted the two victims as they were smoking. Per documents, one of the Knicks fans said that the pulled out a knife to deter Funke, then put it back in his pocket, “as he had no intention of using it.”
Funke then pulled out his own knife and allegedly stabbed the man in his back, according to documents. The other Knicks fan attempted to pull Funke off of his friend and cut his leg against the patio’s stoop, according to court documents. Both men were “bleeding profusely,” according to police.
Emergency responders took both men to the hospital, and police pulled Funke over as he attempted to leave the brewery’s parking lot. The stabbing victim suffered a broken rib and a minor tear in a lung, police said, according to News 8 in Indianapolis.
Per the documents, Funke told police that “they were talking s***” and that one of the men had pushed him to the ground and “began punching him in the face.” Funke acknowledged that he “retrieved his pocketknife from his hoodie and swung it around towards (one of the Knicks fans) back with his right hand,” according to the report.
Funke told police that the Knicks fans started the fight. Multiple witnesses identified Funke as the “primary aggressor in this incident,” according to the court documents.
Funke is charged with one count of battery by means of a deadly weapon, one count of battery resulting in serious bodily injury and one count of criminal recklessness committed with a deadly weapon, all felonies, according to the documents.
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