PORT ST. JOHN, Fla. -- A machete-wielding man chased off three young men from a wooded lot near his house Thursday, trapping one of them up a tree before sheriff’s deputies arrived.

Luke Weinstein said he stepped outside his house on Kings Highway to have his first cigarette of the day when he spotted the men lurking in the shrubs of a vacant lot across the street. He yelled at them and started after them, then ran back into his garage to grab his machete.

Wearing nothing but a pair of black shorts, a barefooted Weinstein chased the trio into a wooded lot two doors down from his own house.

Two got away, but one young man climbed into a pine tree, where Weinstein trapped him until a deputy arrived.

The deputy showed up at the wrong house, Weinstein said. While he tried to get the deputy’s attention, the youth climbed out of the tree and ran off.

The sheriff’s office is reporting it as a suspicious incident.

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