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By Jeffrey Gilbert

AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Monday, November 3, 2003

It's like something that happens in the movies, Carter Acevedo said: Eight teenagers are stabbed at a party on Halloween night.

But for Acevedo and seven other Austin High School students, that movie turned into a reality show late Friday in West Austin.

"You never think you would hear about something like this happening so close to home," Acevedo, a 15-year-old who was stabbed twice, said Sunday.

Geoff Sowash, 17, said he was hanging out beside the house where the party was held when someone approached him saying he had just been stabbed.

"I thought he was joking," Sowash said. "He lifted up his shirt and there was this big, thick stab wound. It was pretty gruesome."

Sowash said he wanted to call the police, but he didn't know the exact address of the house. He was in the back yard, trying to find someone who knew the address, when he noticed a guy walking quickly toward him.

"I didn't know what was going on," he said. "He had no emotion on his face. He was completely dead looking. He wasn't acting like he was nuts."

Then, Sowash said, it felt like he was being hit. Instead, he was being stabbed.

"After it happened, I was just trying to get out of there."

The accused is Dustin Scott McManus, 17, a Bowie High student, who was charged with one count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, a second-degree felony. He was released from jail Saturday night on $25,000 bail. Austin police spokesman Joe Munoz said he expects more charges against McManus to be filed. McManus turned 17 on Thursday, so he was no longer a juvenile.

Police said the known victims are Sowash; Acevedo; Ramzi Samir Abbyad, 17; Eleanor Draughn, 17; Christopher James, 17; Barney Cockburn, 17; Jennifer Carter, 16; and Marshall Lardon, 16.

Several victims on Sunday described the series of attacks at a party that followed the Austin High versus Westlake High football game. Some stabbings occurred in the yard of the home. The victims said they do not know what sparked the attacks or why specific victims were chosen. They also said they did not know McManus. A woman who answered the phone at the McManus home Sunday declined to comment.

The party took place at 203 Lacey Ave. near Rollingwood, police said. County records show the house is owned by Thomas Cornelius, 48. Residents of the house would not comment Sunday.

Police said they think McManus had taken drugs that night, but they would not elaborate. "Witnesses said he was under the influence" of drugs, Munoz said.

Officers responded to a 911 call that reported a stabbing shortly after midnight Friday, Munoz said.

At the scene, the officers discovered McManus restrained on the ground. Some of the victims were still there, while others had already been taken to the hospital, Munoz said.

"It was a pretty chaotic scene from what I understand," he said.

None of the injuries is life threatening, Munoz said. Draughn, Cockburn and Carter remained in stable condition at Brackenridge on Sunday, hospital spokeswoman Lynda Shanblum said. Lardon was released Sunday morning, and the others were treated and released.

Sowash said he was driven from the house by a friend, with Acevedo and Lardon, to meet an ambulance at a nearby grocery store on Lake Austin Boulevard. They were taken to Brackenridge Hospital, where Sowash was treated and released about 7 a.m. Saturday.

He said there were no adults in the house during the party.

Sowash and James said there was alcohol at the party, but police wouldn't confirm it.

"Everyone was relaxing and chilling, and then everything started moving real fast," Sowash said.

Acevedo said he was sitting down, talking to a friend when he heard someone throw a trash can behind him. He looked to his left and saw Abbyad fall to the ground.

"I thought he was just playing around," Acevedo said. "I didn't think it was anything serious."

Acevedo said he turned to his right and looked back and saw something going into his back. McManus had stabbed him, he said.

Acevedo said he didn't feel anything, and he was able to get up and stumble to the back yard to get help.

"People were telling me my hand was all bloody and my shirt was all bloody, but I was so confused with what went on," he said.

James was part of the group that took McManus down. He and friends were standing around the back yard when people came running toward them, he said.

"At first we thought it was because a cop was inside," James said. "But then we saw this kid walking behind the crowd of people. He looked really dazed, but like he knew what he was doing."

McManus was twirling his knife around while he walked, James said. It was a 3-inch lock-blade knife, James said, and it looked like a hunting knife.

As he came toward them, a friend of James' threw his drink on McManus while another friend came from behind and tackled him, James said.

"When (McManus) was knocked to the ground, I was knocked with him," James said. "He grabbed my legs and slashed the back of my calf and right behind my knee."

James said he was able to get a rock from the sidewalk to throw at McManus, which made him drop his knife. Everyone then jumped on top of McManus and waited for the police to arrive, James said.

"It was unreal," James said. "It blows my mind that I was part of this."

Julie Acevedo, Carter's mother, said she was sleeping when she got the 1 a.m. call from the hospital letting her know that her son had been stabbed.

"It's the phone call you never want to get," she said. "They told us he was fine and alert."

At the hospital, parents of the victims were gathered in a room. Everyone was calm, she said, but in shock. Carter was treated until about 3 a.m.

"We are very lucky that none of the kids were seriously injured," Julie Acevedo said. "When we got home, (Carter) wanted to talk about it and relive it, as anyone would who has been through a trauma. He was shaking. His adrenaline was going."

Julie said she knew her son was going to a party after the football game but thought the parents were going to be there. She said she is just as much to blame as anyone else.

"I need to know where my son is at all times," she said. "I made a wrong assumption, but as parents of teenagers, I know things can get out of hand sometimes."

Today, when the eight victims and other students return to school from what has been a tiring weekend, things are going to be different, Carter Acevedo said.

"It's going to be sad," Acevedo said. "People are just going to be finding out about it. It's always scary to see people you usually see in the hallways of school get hurt."

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