Crime & Safety
Man Charged in Johnston Car Fight
Johnston Police provided the information for this report. Where an arrest is noted, it does not indicate a conviction.
A Central Falls man added an arrest in Johnston to other charges brought by state and other local police.
Johnston Police on Aug. 22 charged Richardson Jean Baptiste, 23, of Central Falls, with domestic disorderly conduct and refusing to relinquish a phone from a July 29 incident at Cherry Hill Manor.
According to police reports, Baptiste had been driving his girlfriend to the facility when, she told police, he struck her in the face in the midst of an argument.
After stopping the car outside the manor, Baptiste took her phone and threw it in the nearby bushes, then fled on foot toward Manton Avenue, Ptlm. Michael Protano reported, quoting the victim.
Protano noted that he "did not observe any marks [or] injuries on her face."
About a month after the incident, Cranston Police arrested Baptiste on the Johnston warrant and handed him over to local officers.
Since he had been under a court warrant on previous charges of driving with a suspended license and obstructing police brought in May by Pawtucket Police, Baptiste was ordered held at the Adult Correctional Institutions until Aug. 28.
Baptiste also faces a charge of domestic assault filed Aug. 10 by Providence Police, and also has a pending case of driving without a license brought by State Police in January.
He is next scheduled for a pre-trial hearing on Sept. 4 on the Providence charges, and Sept. 13 for the Johnston case. Baptiste is subject to a no-contact order following his not guilty plea to the Johnston charge.
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