Tewksbury man threatens to kill neighbor’s dogs with knife

TEWKSBURY, Mass. — The video is scary to watch; a man screaming and running after another man with a big knife on Shawsheen Street on Tuesday afternoon.

“I just saw a guy out here with a knife chasing another guy,” said Penny Estee, who witnessed the assault.

Estee told Boston 25 she heard a commotion out front, and when she opened the door, she was stunned.

“He reached into his pants or his pocket and pulled out his knife, and he started to chase the other guy down the street,” she said.

The man with the knife, Christopher Canty, 49, of Tewksbury, was arraigned on Wednesday. In Lowell District Court we learned this started over dogs.

“He said one of the men in there with a goatee was threatening to kill his dogs,” said the prosecutor.

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Canty was the man with the goatee and, according to prosecutors on Tuesday, at about 4 p.m. he lost it after an argument with the victim.

“The alleged victim says as he approached the man with a goatee. He was brandishing what he describes a large Rambo style knife. When the defendant saw that knife, he said he picked up two rocks in the event he needed to protect himself,” said the prosecutor.

This all went down on busy Shawsheen Street where stunned drivers pulled over, one took cell phone video and others called 911.

“Crazy, I mean everyone stopped. The traffic was backed up. A bus driver opened [the] door and said, ‘I called the police,’” Estee said.

Police swarmed the area. Canty had ditched the knife, but police found it and arrested him. But even in custody, Canty continued to make threats.

“And at one point made a statement that he was going to […] make Tewksbury famous by committing ‘the best murder this town has ever seen,’” said the prosecutor.

Canty was taken to Bridgewater State Hospital Tuesday night. He’s being held now without bail until a dangerousness hearing on October 26.

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