Cash bond set for Pine Grove stabbing suspect

By Brandi Makuski

A Pine Grove man is being held on $1,500 cash bond after allegedly stabbing his sister’s boyfriend in the abdomen.

Urian Lopez, 19, appeared before Judge Robert Shannon in Portage Co. Circuit Court on Monday with an interpreter and attorney Katrina Roberts-Turner. Lopez was arrested shortly before 9 p.m. on March 25 from the 8500 block of Pine St. in the Township of Pine Grove near Bancroft.

Assistant District Attorney Robert Jambois said the attack appeared to be unprovoked, and his office plans to charge Lopez with second-degree recklessly endangering safety while armed with a dangerous weapon.

According to the incident report, Sgt. Nikki Lukas from the Portage Co. Sheriff’s Office was first at the scene. Lopez’s sister told Lukas that she and the victim were in bed for the night when Lopez entered the room and asked to use her vehicle. She said no and Lopez left the room.

He returned a few moments later holding a knife and a pillow. As he stood in the doorway of the bedroom, he began cutting the pillow with the knife and said, “Look how sharp it is.”

Lopez then placed the pillow over the victim’s face, Jambois said, and “got on top of [the victim] and stabbed him in the stomach.”

During the attack, Lopez reportedly cried, “I’ve got to do it because he’s going to kill me; I’ve got to do it because he’s not good enough for my sister,” Jambois said.

Via video from the Portage Co. Jail, Lopez denied making that statement through his interpreter.

The woman told deputies she ran from the bedroom and asked her mother to call the police. When she returned to the bedroom, the woman said both men were standing next to the bed, and “it appeared as though Urian was trying to stab [the victim] again,” Jambois said.

Lopez’s mother eventually got the knife away from him, the report said, and the victim locked himself in another room.

The victim was transported by Spirit Air Ambulance to Marshfield, where Sheriff Mike Lukas said he underwent “several hours” of surgery. He is expected to survive, but Jambois said as of Monday afternoon his office had no updates on the victim’s condition.

Lopez returns to court for an initial appearance on April 15 at 1:30 p.m.