A 27-year-old Annapolis man was recovering at Johns Hopkins Hospital yesterday after he was stabbed three times in the stomach while trying to save someone from being beaten in Charles Village.
The stabbing is the latest in a string of violent assaults in the neighborhood that borders the Johns Hopkins University and is known for its colorfully painted townhouses, busy restaurants and active community association.
The victim, Nathaniel Treat, had been at a Hampden bar called Rocket to Venus with his older brother and a friend early Thursday morning. The three walked back to Charles Village, where they were staying, when they saw an assault under way at St. Paul and 31st streets about 2:20 a.m.
"We started yelling," said Benjamin Treat, 31, the victim's older brother. "We started running toward him. We got in between them and started yelling."
Then a second assailant emerged from the shadows.
"This giant guy with a black bandana over his face popped out," Nathaniel Treat said. "He knocked me out. He beat on me while I was on the ground." His brother escaped with a black eye.
It is unclear whether the two suspects were working together.
Meanwhile, Nathaniel Treat tussled with the first suspect and was stabbed, said his brother and police. One of the wounds punctured his small intestine, according to his brother.
The two assailants ran away, and Nathaniel Treat called for help from his cell phone.
"My little brother was yelling, 'I think that guy stabbed me.' We pulled his shirt off, and there was blood everywhere," Benjamin Treat said.
Benjamin Treat went to the hospital in the ambulance with his younger brother. "They rushed him right in," he said. He waited while doctors operated.
Officer Troy Harris, a police spokesman, confirmed that the three were trying to help another man when they became victims. Harris said that police canvassed the area and did not find any suspects. The investigation is continuing, he said, adding that the original victim, who was not identified, was treated at Hopkins Hospital and released.
Yesterday, Benjamin Treat said he was frustrated with the police response. He said that he was not interviewed by detectives until 1:30 p.m. yesterday - about 35 hours after the stabbing.
He said that police interviewed him only after he and his mother called several times.
Sterling Clifford, a Police Department spokesman, said that patrol officers came to the scene immediately and took witness statements.
The detectives on call Thursday morning were tied up interviewing - and then arresting - a suspect in a nonfatal shooting, Clifford said.
"In the case of the nonlife-threatening injury, it is not unusual for the detective not to respond to the scene," Clifford said.
In late May, a man stabbed a 57-year-old woman in the 2600 block of St. Paul St. in Charles Village. The woman was carrying groceries home when she was attacked. She was helped by people nearby, and others held her assailant until police came.
In early June, a man killed a cabdriver in a road rage incident in the 100 block of W. 28th St., also in Charles Village.
And in early July, a man attempted to abduct a 29-year old Hopkins graduate student in Waverly, near the Charles Village border.
annie.linskey@baltsun.com