DA: Bystanders keep South End man from cutting wife's head off

Zi Wen Chen, 49, was ordered held in lieu of $10,000 bail today after he was found struggling with two men who were managing to keep him from applying a butcher knife to his wife's neck at Shawmut Avenue and W. Newton Street on Thursday morning, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney's office.

The DA's office, which had sought bail of $1 million, supplies this account:

Boston Police responded to the scene to find the victim, a 46-year-old South End woman, covered in a bed sheet and crying while two men wrestled with Chen a short distance from a large butcher knife on the ground.

The men told officers that Chen had chased the victim out of a nearby building, grabbed her by the hair, and dragged her back while swinging the knife at her neck – apparently trying to “cut her head off,” witnesses said.

One of the men, a worker at a nearby building, told officers that they tackled the man while others nearby removed the knife from his hands and called police. The other man who intervened on the woman’s behalf left the area without speaking to police.

Officers took the man into custody while additional responding officers spoke to the woman. She told investigators that the incident began with a minor argument but escalated when her unemployed husband wanted money to leave the United States. She told him she had no money to give him, and he became verbally abusive.

It was at this point, the woman said, that Chen became violent. He allegedly grabbed the knife, chased her from the house, and attacked her, cutting her hands, arms, feet, stomach, and torso.

Innocent, etc.