Vandergrift man accused of strangling woman during dispute about cheating
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A man who was kicked out of a woman’s house when she found out he was cheating was charged with a felony after she told Allegheny Township police that he strangled her when he learned she was in contact with another man on social media.
Nico Joshua Hawley, 19, of the 500 block of Lowell Street in Vandergrift was charged with felony strangulation along with simple assault, disorderly conduct and harassment. He was taken to the Westmoreland County jail in lieu of a $15,000 cash bond. He faces a preliminary hearing before District Judge Cheryl Peck Yacopek on Tuesday, Oct. 4, according to court records.
Police wrote in Hawley’s arrest papers that an officer was dispatched to an apartment on Sandlewood Drive shortly after 8:30 p.m. on Sept. 23 for a domestic dispute, but the man involved in the altercation fled into the nearby woods.
Officers were unable to find the man, but the woman identified him as Hawley. She said he had been staying with her for several nights but earlier in the day was asked to leave after she “called him out for cheating,” the criminal complaint said.
The woman said Hawley returned later in the evening and she let him inside so he wouldn’t get angry, according to the complaint.
The woman said Hawley went through her cellphone while she was showering and found that she was communicating with another man through the Snapchat application, police said.
She said Hawley confronted her about the Snapchat and then “struck her in the head and choked her on the bed” when she tried to grab her phone back from him, the complaint said.
She told police that Hawley smashed her phone, broke the television set and punched a hole in the wall before leaving, according to the complaint.
Investigators said the woman had redness on her throat and a bleeding, swollen finger but declined to be checked out by medical personnel who responded to the scene.