Tasers at 30 Paces?

[Kip Powick]

BOULDER, Colo. — It wasn't exactly pistols at 30 paces, but police say a security company supervisor and a restaurateur shot each other with tasers in a “bonehead” confrontation over parking.

Officers said neither man needed medical attention after the Saturday confrontation, but Harvey Epstein, co-owner of Mamacitas restaurant, was arrested on suspicion of felony menacing and using a stun gun.

Mr. Epstein, 36, didn't immediately respond to messages seeking comment left at the restaurant and his Longmont home Sunday by The Associated Press.

A police report said Epstein and Casey Dane, a supervisor for Colorado Security Services Inc., were arguing over a metal boot that one of Dane's guards had clamped on a wheel of a van parked behind Mamacitas.

Mr. Dane told police he was afraid Mr. Epstein was going to hit him with a 60 centimetre-long pair of bolt cutters. Mr. Epstein told police he had only tried to remove the boot with the bolt cutters and hadn't threatened anyone with them.

Mr. Epstein told police Mr. Dane put his hand on a holstered pistol and threatened to shoot him. Mr. Dane told The Associated Press by telephone that he did put his hand on the holstered pistol but never threatened to shoot Epstein.

Both men drew Tasers.

“They shot each other,” Police Sergeant Pat Wyton told the Camera newspaper. “It was just kind of a bonehead deal.”

The guard claimed the van, owned by a Mamacitas employee, was on property he was hired to patrol. The van owner denied that.