Colorado man accused of trying to kill father-in-law with axe

A Boulder County District Court judge set bond at $1 million Thursday for 32-year-old Michael Lucky. 

Lucky turned himself in to authorities in Boulder about eight hours after his father-in-law was found bloodied and unconscious in a home southwest of Longmont on Tuesday.

Lucky has since been charged with attempted murder, burglary, and five charges related to domestic violence.

Hours prior to his 60-year-old father-in-law being found injured, Lucky's online video conversation with his wife's family regarding child custody was cut short by the family, according to the arrest affidavit in the case. Lucky's ensuing texts to his wife were considered "threatening" by the family. 

It was the latest conflict in what the family described as a months-long escalatiin of harassing behavior.

Most recently, police were called to the in-laws' residence just after midnight Dec. 19. According to the affidavit, someone at the house called 9-1-1 after Lucky's mother-in-law found the exterior door to their bedroom had been shattered. The woman claimed she heard a 'boom' during the night, but added she sleeps without her hearing aid and thought the sound was thunder. She also told investigators she felt slight movement in the bed and assumed the father-in-law was pushing dogs that had been frightened by the thunder off the bed. 

But when she flipped a light switch, the woman found the father-in-law lying on his back in the bed. 

The glass from the damaged door had been shattered inward, according to the affidavit.

Investigators described the father-in-law's injuries as blunt-force trauma and sharp-force trauma to his head, neck and face. In daylight, they also found an axe on the in-laws' property that had blood on it.

The father-in-law was flown by helicopter to a Level 1 trauma hospital in Lakewood. 

Lucky, his wife, and their newborn child lived together in Firestone, according to the affidavit. Officers from the Firestone Police Department were sent to the home in May and September. The 9-1-1 caller in May told dispatchers that Lucky was being "violent" and "destroying the house."

Lucky's wife told investigators that Lucky told her, "This time it's the wall, next time it will be you."

The father-in-law told investigators at that time he became concerned for his daughter's safety after seeing the damage done to the interior of the Firestone home.     

Lucky's wife acquired a protection order against him. She also provided 36 pages of text conversations between she and Lucky to investigators.   

Lucky, according the statements attributed to him in the affidavit, vascillated between an expressd desire for reconciliation with his wife and a contempt for she and her family, and between accepting blame for their problems and then assigning it to her.

Online court records indicate Lucky's wife filed for divorce in September.    

Lucky was arrested in November for violating a protection order at the home of his in-laws. By that time, his wife and her one-year-old son had moved out of their Firestone home. 

At one point during the alleged build-up, Lucky sent a pre-written suicide note to his wife for delivery to their son, according to the affidavit. 

Lucky is scheduled to return to court in March for a preliminary hearing.