‘Skinhead’ arrested in brutal attack near Yacolt

A Vancouver man described in court papers as a skinhead made his first appearance Thursday on suspicion of attempted murder.

Michael J. Harvey, 23, was ordered to remain in the Clark County Jail on $500,000 bail by Superior Court Judge John Wulle.

Arraignment was set for Nov. 20.

Harvey was arrested Wednesday by a detective from the Clark County Sheriff’s Office who had been investigating a Nov. 1 incident in which a Vancouver man was driven to Moulton Falls Park, about three miles south of Yacolt. The victim was severely beaten and tossed from a footbridge into the water.

He was left behind but made it out to Northeast Lucia Falls Road, where he flagged a passing motorist. He was treated at Southwest Washington Medical Center for a punctured lung, multiple stab wounds and abrasions.

Two other suspects were named in an affidavit by Detective Eric O’Dell.
Sgt. Scott Schanaker said Thursday that deputies are looking for those two men.

Longtime ‘Juggalo’

According to O’Dell’s affidavit, the victim, Joshua Smith, is a longtime “Juggalo,” and Harvey is a skinhead.

Juggalos are followers of the Detroit rap/horror group Insane Clown Posse who have their own slang and hand signs.

Juggalos sometimes wear white-and-black clown face makeup or, more often, clothing adorned with deranged-looking clowns. They’ve been arrested for violent crimes across the country. In 2006 in Tacoma, for example, a group of Juggalos attacked people in a park with hatchets.

Incidentally, a few hours before Smith was taken from Fourth Plain Boulevard to Moulton Falls, a male attacked two other males in Evergreen Park at Fourth Plain and Neals Lane with a hatchet. No arrest has been made in that case, and a detective from the Vancouver Police Department said Thursday there’s no indication the hatchet attack and Smith’s beating are connected.

In O’Dell’s affidavit, he wrote that around midnight, Smith was on Fourth Plain when the suspects drove up and told him to get into their car because someone wanted to talk to him. They drove up to Moulton Falls and were all drinking beer before one suspect began the assault by smashing a bottle over Smith’s head, knocking him to the ground.

“(Smith) did not know why he was being beaten,” O’Dell wrote. “He said the suspects were telling him as they were beating him that he wasn’t a Juggalo and he wasn’t a skinhead. (Smith) said they kept saying something about ‘transformers,’ which he did not understand.”

One definition of “transformer” is someone who switches gang affiliations.

Smith said Harvey wanted him to become a skinhead, according to O’Dell’s affidavit.

Harvey was released from prison about six months ago after finishing a sentence for drug possession.

Stephanie Rice: 360-735-4549 or stephanie.rice@columbian.com.