BEVERLY — A Randolph County man is behind bars after allegedly ramming another vehicle repeatedly with his car on purpose.

Shawn Luke Howell, 42, of Beverly is charged with two counts of malicious assault and one count of attempt to commit felony punishable by imprisonment for a term less than life, all felonies. He is being held in the Tygart Valley Regional Jail on a $25,000 cash-only bond, set by Magistrate Tracy Harper.

According to the criminal complaint, filed by Trooper Thomas J. Sclimenti, with the Elkins Detachment of the West Virginia State Police, on July 13, at about 6:37 p.m., to a residence in Beverly.

At the scene, the alleged victim told police that she was trying to leave when Howell “had trouble starting his car and was blaming her like she had done something to it,” according to the complaint. While the alleged victim was backing her vehicle out, “she heard a loud revving, and her vehicle … was rammed into by Mr. Howell. Mr. Howell then proceeded to back up and ram her vehicle several times, while (she) attempted to move the vehicle away.”

During the incident, a juvenile in the alleged victim’s vehicle hit their “head on the headrest of the vehicle,” the complaint states. Witnesses told police they saw Howell ram the alleged victim’s vehicle and then hit a tree with his vehicle.

Sclimenti wrote that he “observed severe damage to the front of Mr. Howell’s vehicle, corresponding with severe damage to the driver’s door of (the alleged victim’s) vehicle,” and “ruts in the grass leading leading from Mr. Howell’s vehicle to (the alleged victim’s) vehicle.”

The officer wrote that he “observed a large sword and what appeared to be a firearm in the vehicle belonging to Mr. Howell,” and determined that the firearm was a BB pistol, and the sword was “apparently real.” In the vehicle, Sclimenti also found a “zippered container and what appeared to be a THC vape inside the vehicle in plain view.”