For the second time in a year and a half, an Aspen-area transient was arrested for brandishing a hatchet at fellow residents of the Intercept Lot, according to court documents and statements in court on Feb. 12.
Justin Schaaf, 35, was charged with felony menacing after two other men who live in their vehicles at the park-and-ride lot at Brush Creek Road and U.S. 82 called 911 Feb. 9 to report that he was “waving a hatchet around,” according to an affidavit filed in Pitkin County District Court.
Both men, however, showed up at Schaaf’s advisement hearing in District Court and said Schaaf was a good friend and they didn’t want to press charges. One told Magistrate Judge Susan Ryan that Schaaf had been “under an extreme amount of stress” and that they’d never had problems before.
“I don’t think he meant to do what he did,” the man said.
“We all live at the Intercept Lot and try to coexist,” the other man said. “I don’t think he needs to be removed from the community.”
The two men told Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies that Schaaf had called on Feb. 9 and wanted them to return a fuel can and a broom they’d borrowed, according to the affidavit. When the men walked across the parking lot to return the items that night, Schaaf began to yell, saying they shouldn’t take things that weren’t theirs, the affidavit states.
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