Man gets jail time in samurai sword attack

A Tamaqua man who using a samurai sword to threaten and attack people will serve jail time.

Richard F. Houser Jr., 55, was sentenced by Schuylkill County Judge James P. Goodman to six to 23 months in the county jail after pleading guilty to having a weapon he was prohibited from having and simple assault.

Additional charges of possession of an instrument of crime, simple assault, recklessly endangering another person, aggravated assault, terroristic threats, and strangulation were dropped.

Tamaqua police charged Houser with committing the crimes on Oct. 7, 2017.

On that day, police responded to the 300 block of Hazle Street for a domestic incident involving a sword. At about the same time, a second call came in involving an assault on Cottage Avenue.

Both calls involved Houser, who lives in the 200 block of West Cottage Avenue.

Houser punched a man on Cottage Avenue and knocked a cellphone from the victim’s hand. Houser retrieved the sword from his house and threatened to cut off the victim’s face.

Houser then ran to Hazle Street, where he entered a home where the residents were eating dinner and threatened them.

He poked the man in the stomach with the sword. Houser continued brandishing the sword, and as the man tried to wrestle it away, Houser struck him in the head and face, and tried to choke him.

The man was taken to the hospital.