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Police: Couple fights off attackers wearing clown masks with child's scooter

Texas City Clown Mask Robbery Suspects.jpg
Posted at 3:04 PM, Feb 08, 2019
and last updated 2019-02-08 17:08:12-05

TEXAS CITY, TX — Authorities in a town southeast of Houston say a couple was able to fight off two attackers wearing clown masks by making use of what was around them.

The Texas City Police Department says around 2:30 a.m. on February 1st officers responded to a home for a report of a disturbance.

Police say the two suspects, later identified as 32-year-old Luis Jimenez and 35-year-old Jose Lugo, approached a man and a woman who were sitting in a vehicle parked in their driveway.

One of the suspects placed a machete to the throat of the man, who KTRK-TV identified as Joseph Nelson, and tried to rob them.

"He reached his hand through the window, put it on my throat like this and I'm like 'Dude, you serious, you trying to rob me with a machete?'" Nelson told the TV station.

Police say Nelson was able to get control of the machete from the suspect and his wife, Aretha Cardinal, grabbed a child's scooter that was in the driveway and used it to smash the suspect's vehicle as they tried to get away.

"Any weapon is good for me if I can get you off me and my husband, that's what I'm going to do. I used the scooter, broke it in half," Cardinal said to KTRK.

Officers arrived and took both Jimenez and Lugo into custody. Each has a bond of $100,000 and remains in the Galveston County Jail.