EVANS CITY — Bleeding from a gaping wound to the stomach, 27-year-old Christopher Matthews immediately identified for police the man who stabbed him — his uncle.

He wanted William C. Matthews arrested for assault.

That was two weeks ago.

At a preliminary hearing Wednesday, the victim's memory of the alleged attack was far from certain. He seemed even less certain of the suspect's intent.

The word "accident" peppered his testimony.

But despite the victim's seeming uncertainty of how he was wounded that night, District Judge Wayne Seibel ordered Matthews held for court on charges that he intentionally stabbed his nephew.

Matthews, 49, of Forward Township, who is charged with aggravated assault, simple assault and disorderly conduct, remains in the Butler County Prison on $50,000 bail.

Christopher Matthews is being held there, too, on unrelated warrants for violating his probation stemming from a pair of simple assault cases in 2007 and 2008.

Evans City Patrolman William Smolensky testified it was about 10:45 p.m. Nov. 3 when he received the call for an apparent stabbing.

When he got to Wahl Avenue, he found Christopher Matthews in back of a home where he had gone for help.

"I saw the victim clutching his upper stomach area with blood covering his jeans," Smolensky said. "I asked him what happened.

"He said, 'I've been stabbed.' I asked who did it? He said, 'Billy Matthews.'"

The officer described the injury as a "deep puncture." He also smelled alcohol on the man's breath.

Soon, an ambulance was taking Christopher Matthews to Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh, but not before police had some questions.

He said he had been stabbed in a friend's Jeep parked in back of an East Main Street bar in the borough. Hours earlier, he and the defendant had fought. The nephew had gotten the better of the fisticuffs.

"The victim stated to (Smolensky) several times that he wanted Mr. Matthews arrested," according to a police affidavit.

"Did (the victim) ever say it was an accident?" prosecutor Russ Karl asked the officer at the hearing.

"No," Smolensky answered.

But Christopher Matthews' testimony Wednesday was more conciliatory toward the accused than on the night he was stabbed.

"I don't know if (Matthews) meant to do it," he told Karl. "I was taking it as an accident."

The younger Matthews admitted on cross-examination that he had "maybe eight beers" that night.

"It's hard to recall what happened, isn't it?" asked public defender Ryan Helsel, Matthews' attorney.

"Through the panic, yeah" Christopher Matthews replied.

He remembered being in the driver's seat of the Jeep; the defendant was in the front passenger seat.

He also recollected the fight with his uncle about five hours earlier. But it was done and over with; no hard feelings.

Moments before the stabbing, "everything else was fine," he told Karl.

"So it wouldn't make any sense for (Matthews) to assault you at all?" Helsel asked.

"No sense at all," Christopher Matthews said.

He said he never saw his uncle stab him nor did he see anything in the defendant's hand that could have caused the injury.

Christopher Matthews' hospital treatment lasted about three hours. Soon after being released, he turned himself in to police because he knew they wanted him on the warrants.

Not long after getting the call, police had tracked down the defendant at a home on Marshall Alley in Evans City.

Matthews appeared to be "very intoxicated," police said. He had a swollen nose and forehead, injuries apparently sustained from the earlier fight with his nephew.

The suspect was placed in the back of a patrol car. While being driven to the station, Matthews made a voluntary admission, Smolensky said.

"He said he didn't mean to stab his nephew," the officer testified, "without me even asking a question."