The five faced off like gang rivals in the 1961 movie “West Side Story,” but with a modern twist: They first challenged each other on cellphones.
“They were text-messaging taunts,” said Fountain’s Deputy Police Chief Mike Barnett of the men brandishing weapons including baseball bats and a machete.
Barnett said the Friday afternoon incident was a sign of the times in the bedroom community 8 miles south of Colorado Springs.
” ‘Hey you want to talk some smack, why don’t you bring it,’ ” Barnett quoted one of the suspects as saying in a text message.
Barnett considered punishing the five using an 1800s-era law forbidding dueling.
Ultimately, Joshua Seaman, 19, Tony Pinnegar, 22, Antonio Archuleta, 21, Brandon Strickland, 19 and Luis Nieves, 20, were all cited for disorderly conduct and released.
Given the circumstances, the battle didn’t have much of a chance to develop into the bloody confrontation both sides had envisioned. It became little more than a cursing and shouting match because of location and timing.
“It wasn’t a well-thought-out fight,” Barnett said.
One suspect texted a threat just after noon Friday and another returned a text challenge, telling his rival to meet him at his house on the 100 block of Cherry Circle. The first suspect texted two friends, the second enlisted one.
Barnett, an administrator who rarely goes out on calls, was in the police station dispatch center at 222 N. Santa Fe Ave. when calls came flooding in at 12:50 p.m. from the normally quiet neighborhood. One woman was so frightened she had chest pains.
“Fortunately it was only two blocks from the police station,” Barnett said. “Basically we just crossed one road, hung a left and we were on the scene.”
They caught the five suspects each brandishing a weapon: a tire iron, a metal pipe, two bats and a 2-foot-long machete.
“If it went south, somebody could have passed away,” Barnett said.
Barnett and another deputy pulled their handguns out and ordered the five to get face down on the pavement.
“They were taunting each other even when they were on the ground with handcuffs on,” he said.
The suspects refused to say specifically what the fight was all about but Barnett said none of them has been previously linked to gangs.
Kirk Mitchell: 303-954-1206 or kmitchell@denverpost.com
