BELLINGHAM, WA (MyBellinghamNow.com) – A man received a lengthy sentence Thursday for attacking a man with a machete in the homeless encampment near the Bellingham Walmart.

Keoni M. Wilson was sentenced in Whatcom Superior Court to 13-and-a-half years in prison after pleading guilty to attacking the man he claimed had assaulted his mother.

The police report states that the victim went to the encampment last Aug. 11 to buy fentanyl pills from another person. Wilson approached the man from behind and slashed his wrist with the machete, nearly severing the man’s hand. He told the victim that it was retaliation for an earlier assault on his mother.

Bellingham Police arrested Keoni Wilson in October after finding him inside a tent in the encampment. Officers found a sawed-off shotgun in the tent and arrested the previously convicted felon for first-degree assault and suspicion of unlawful possession of a firearm.