GRAND RAPIDS, MI – A couple who were refused re-entry to a casino after a woman urinated on herself have been indicted on federal charges for allegedly assaulting a tribal police officer.
The officer was stabbed repeatedly in the chest and face with a pen, the FBI says.
Aaron Martin Vorac, 37, was indicted Thursday, Jan. 26, by a federal grand jury, on a charge of forcible assault and infliction of bodily injury on a federal officer.
Carla Michele Weiskopf was indicted on charges of forcibly assaulting, resisting or impeding a federal officer and being a disorderly person for being intoxicated in a public place, records show.
The incident happened around 4:30 p.m. Jan. 15 at Odawa Casino Resort in Petoskey.
The couple was told to leave the casino after the woman urinated on herself near the craps table, FBI special agent R. Scott Ray wrote in a criminal complaint.
The FBI said the couple tried twice to re-enter before casino security called police.
George Closser, a tribal police officer for the Little Traverse Band of Odawa Indians, responded to the scene. He asked the couple for identification. Vorac allegedly said he and his wife just wanted to leave.
Vorac then got out of his vehicle and approached the officer before a scuffle broke out, the FBI said.
“Vorac made a statement indicating there was going to be a problem and that he was not going to be arrested for something he did not do,” Ray wrote in court records.
He said surveillance video showed “Vorac punching Officer Closser in the groin several times and then stabbing the officer in the chest and face with what is believed to be a pen.”
Casino security officers then pulled Vorac off the officer, the FBI said.
Police contend the wife interfered with her husband’s arrest.
The Bureau of Indian Affairs issues special law-enforcement commissions to tribal police officers to assist in enforcing federal laws applicable to Indian Country.
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