A Florida sex offender is behind bars after allegedly slashing a teenager’s neck with a box cutter while he walked along the Daytona Beach Boardwalk with his parents on Valentine’s Day.
After spending the day at the Daytona International Speedway, Sullivan Clarke, 13, was talking on the phone while walking back to his hotel with his parents.
His mother, Lori, saw a man approach Sullivan and quickly slice his neck.
“I thought he was stealing Sully’s phone,” Lori told affiliate FOX 35 Orlando. “As soon as he slashed him, I yelled and I said ‘Hey!’”
Sullivan’s father, Jerod, said as soon as they realized what happened, they could see their son’s neck “gashed wide open.”
Doctors told the family if the cut had been one millimeter deeper, the attack would have been fatal. He received 13 stiches.
“The crazy thing is, I turned at the perfect time because I was on the phone and I happened to be looking up at the slingshot [ride] and I turned,” Sullivan said. “That’s how he got the side of my neck and not right [in the center].”
He said it was a miracle the blade didn’t slice his jugular vein.
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The suspect, identified as Jermaine Lynn Long, 44, of Daytona Beach, was later found hiding near an overpass on the pier.
Long is also suspected of hitting a man with a sledgehammer 20 minutes before Sullivan’s attack.
“This guy, this is totally unacceptable,” Jerod told FOX News’ Laura Ingraham Wednesday. “… My son, we wouldn’t even be sitting here right now. It’s totally unacceptable. If I’m at 7-Eleven wheeling a hammer around, I guarantee the least of my concerns is getting arrested.”
Long was eventually found and is charged with two counts of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, according to Volusia County Jail records. He was granted a $50,000 surety bond.
Jail records show Long was released from jail just four days before the attack and had pending charges from an incident in January where he allegedly assaulted two men with a knife and an 8-foot pole.
He was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and touching or striking another person, but prosecutors did not pursue the charges.
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He also has a lengthy criminal history, with prior arrests including:
Lori said it was “shocking” Long could still be out on the streets.
“He’s fallen through the cracks so many times,” she said. “We know that the state of Florida can do better and that we are going to put this horrible pervert away forever. … He was only 11 feet away from me when this happened, maybe 12 feet. It’s absolutely horrifying. He’s had nightmares. … His little brother, who’s 11, who saw everything as well, seeing his brother’s neck split open … there might be some trauma, and we’re very upset.”
A local worker, Andrew Walker, told FOX 35 he was “blown away” because he had spoken with Long minutes before the attack.
“I see the man come down in cuffs, and I was like blown away because that was the same dude I saw walking past me, that just stabbed somebody in the neck,” Walker said.
The family said authorities declined to release footage of the attack, claiming it was evidence.
