Police: Pine man accused of attacking woman with hatchet

Investigators accused a Pine man of attacking a woman with an axe after security video showed him carrying the weapon down the steps following the alleged incident. 

Lee Micheal Swat, 53, of Village Run Road, was charged by Northern Regional Police with a felony count of aggravated assault along with counts of strangulation and simple assault.

He was released from the Allegheny County Jail after a Pittsburgh bail agency posted a $5,000 bond, according to court records.

Swat is scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing before District Judge William Wagner on April 5.

Police wrote in Swat’s arrest papers that officers responded to a call from the woman on Jan. 2 about an assault that happened the previous night.

She told police that sometime during the night Swat attacked her with the axe, leaving a gash on her calf. Police saw blood on a blanket and on the carpeting in the bedroom where she was allegedly assaulted.

The woman also had a dark bruise above her left eye that she suffered during the attack and she told officers that Swat grabbed her by the throat and pressed against her airway.

Images of the wounds to her leg and face was recorded by a police body camera, but there were no visible marks on her neck, police said.

The woman was treated at the scene by medics but declined to be taken to a hospital.

The woman told police the home is equipped with Ring security cameras, but not in the bedrooms.

A camera installed in the home’s living room shows Swat coming down the stairs carrying a hatchet, police said.

During a recorded telephone conversation with police, Swat denied attacking the woman and told them he was staying at the home of a friend the previous night.

Swat stopped answering investigators’ questions after they told him they had video of him carrying the hatchet down the steps, according to the complaint.