Metropolitan Police Department (DC Police / MPD)

Homeless Man Says Devil Told Him to Stab Bridge Inspector

A homeless man admitted stabbing a bridge inspector Thursday afternoon, telling police the devil told him to do it, according to charging documents.

Lance Ammons, 42, stabbed Robert Bolich, 62, four times with a pocket knife on the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge pedestrian walkway, according to charging documents.

Witnesses saw Bolich in his reflective vest waving for help. He ran a short distance before collapsing.

Bolich was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Ammons told police he regained control of his thoughts after the stabbing.

Ammons said he lives in a forest near the bridge and he came to D.C. to prepare for the end of the world, according to charging documents.

In 2007, Ammons was found guilty of assaulting a police officer and received 90-day suspended sentence.

In 2011, he was accused of assaulting a police officer and threatening to do bodily harm, but those charges were dismissed. Prosecutors were not ready to proceed with the case, records say. 

Court documents show Ammons was arrested by U.S. Park Police in 2016 for “threatening to kidnap or cause bodily harm” to someone in front of the Organization of American States Building. It’s not clear whether he was prosecuted for that. A Park Police spokesperson said details of that incident are not available.

Bolich, of Alexandria, Virginia, worked for infrastructure design firm HNTB. He was working on the new Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge.

Ammons is charged with first-degree murder. A D.C. Superior Court judge ordered him held without bond until a Sept. 4 court date.

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