Child stabs 11-year-old in stomach

The wound is not life-threatening, and a 9-year-old is not charged.

By LEANORA MINAI

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 21, 2000

ST. PETERSBURG -- Kyle Mulock, 11, lay on the couch Tuesday afternoon, eating McDonald's french fries and watching cartoons on Nickelodeon.

Several hours before, he was screaming and holding his stomach after he had been stabbed by a 9-year-old boy during an argument several doors down from his house.

"Another half-inch and it would have broken through and hit an organ," said Kyle's mother, Pamula McVicker, 31.

Kyle's stab wound was an inch deep, but it was not life-threatening, Mrs. McVicker said. Doctors at Bayfront Medical Center dressed it and sent Kyle home with a pain reliever and antibiotic.

Police have not charged the 9-year-old neighbor, whose name is being withheld because he is a juvenile. Police said the boys were horsing around. Family members at the 9-year-old boy's home declined to comment Tuesday.

Kyle said the argument inside his friend's house carried over from a pushing and shoving match on Monday.

On Tuesday morning, Kyle was playing at the house with a brother of the 9-year-old boy. They started pushing each other, and the 9-year-old boy grabbed a knife off a table in the kitchen, Kyle said.

"I grabbed the pot and hit him in the arm," said Kyle, a student at Tyrone Middle School.

Kyle said he put the pan down and backed up, and the boy hurled the knife at him.

No adults were home at the time, and neighbors said they heard fighting.

"It was a constant scream like argggggg," said Rick Wilhoit, 45, who was weeding in his garden Tuesday morning. "And then it kept going and going for like three minutes."

After he was stabbed, Kyle stumbled to his house at 5138 5th Ave. N. His mother saw him from the window but did not realize he had been stabbed until he got closer and she saw his bloody shirt.

Kyle's mother said she has mixed feelings about whether or not the 9-year-old boy should be charged. "It's a matter of his temper going up real high," she said. "I don't think it really was intentional."

She said that she and her husband plan to sit down and talk with the boy's parents this weekend.

Even then, Mrs. McVicker said, she will not allow Kyle to play with the 9-year-old boy.

"I don't think I will ever feel comfortable with him being around."

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