11-year-old North Carolina boy who stopped home intruder with machete says 'I knew I had to do something'
An 11-year-old boy from North Carolina stopped an intruder from invading his home by wielding a machete and protecting the house and himself. Braydon Smith said that he knew he had no other choice but to act quickly when a man broke into his family home in Mebane on Friday, June 14.
The sixth-grader shared with the News & Observer, "My heart was beating, but I knew that I had to do something like hit him with something, so I just grabbed a weapon that was nearby." The suspect was eventually identified as 19-year-old Jataveon Dashawn Hall by the police. The suspect had walked through the Smith's mobile home and had grabbed a pellet gun which Braydon knew was not loaded. Hall peeked into Braydon's room where he was hiding after hearing Hall outside along with two accomplices.
Hall had put the weapon down as he started to steal Braydon's cellphone which gave Braydon the chance to strike the man with a machete in the back of the head. Hall then countered Braydon by pushing him to the floor and kicking him many times but fled from the scene when he saw that he was losing a lot of blood.
Braydon shared, "He noticed that he was bleeding in the back of the head really badly. So he just dropped everything and ran out of the door." Hall was arrested on Sunday, June 16, in Burlington and was charged with breaking and entering, second-degree kidnapping, interfering with emergency communications and assault on a child under 12. A judge had set his bail at $175,000 while at a court appearance on Monday, June 17. Authorities shared that as of now no other arrests have been made.
Braydon said that his father had slept on the couch for a couple of days after the incident with a gun close by in case Hall or his accomplices returned to the house. The boy's father said that he was only a few minutes away from the house when he found out about the break-in. The father, 30-year-old Christopher Smith, also shared that his son is rarely home alone. "I trust him. I felt like he could feed himself. And, of course, not burn the house down. And he could defend himself."