A former employee of Island County Juvenile Court Services was sentenced to jail Tuesday for stabbing her husband in the leg last October, according to the Prosecutor’s Office.
Oak Harbor resident Rachel Irvin pleaded guilty in Island County Superior Court to assault in the third degree, according to Chief Criminal Prosecutor Colleen Kenimond.
Judge John Linde gave Irvin a first-time offender waiver, which allowed him to put conditions on the sentence. Linde is the judge in San Juan County; the two Island County judges were recused because Irvin worked for the court.
Linde sentenced Irvin to 90 days in jail, followed by a year of probation. He ordered her to get an alcohol evaluation and follow recommendations.
Kenimond said the sentence was appropriate.
“I truly think she intended tit for tat,” Kenimond said, referring to the fact that Irvin’s husband stabbed her first. “I don’t think she intended to darn-near kill him.”
Island County Detective John Nieder investigated the Oct. 26 incident on Whitney Drive. Three witnesses said that Irvin and her husband were sitting on the couch eating dinner when they started stabbing each other with a steak knife.
The man first stabbed Irvin in the calf with the knife, the report indicates. She got angry, took the knife from him and stabbed at him three times, striking him once in the thigh, the detective wrote.
The knife nicked the man’s femoral artery and he lost a great deal of blood. He was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle in critical condition.
The man has since recovered from the injury.
“He didn’t lose his leg or lose his life, both of which were possible,” Kenimond said.
Both Irvin and her husband appeared to be highly intoxicated, the report states. The man initially told law enforcement that he stabbed his wife and then stabbed himself, court documents indicate.