BOCA RATON, FL (BocaNewsNow.com) (Copyright © 2026 MetroDesk Media, LLC) — A phone call about skipping school on “PSAT day” ended with a teenager bleeding on the ground and Boca Raton resident William Vanderhost in jail. Vanderhost remains in jail Sunday morning.
In a heavily redacted police report just obtained by BocaNewsNow.com, deputies with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office arrested arrested Vanderhost on October 14 on felony charges of domestic battery by strangulation and child abuse without great bodily harm, plus a misdemeanor battery count.
Deputies were called to a domestic disturbance around 5:35 p.m. They found the teen lying outside the home with blood on him, cuts on his lips, red marks on his forehead and a large red mark running down the left side of his neck from his chin to his collar.
According to the probable cause affidavit, the man called earlier that day asking why the teen wasn’t in school. The teen told him it was PSAT day and he didn’t need to go. The call turned to money owed for bills, the man hung up angry, and 10 to 15 minutes later he was pounding on the door. Investigators say he walked straight into the teen’s bedroom, grabbed him by the neck with his forearm, pinned him to the bed and punched him in the face. The teen told deputies the forearm on his neck made it hard to breathe. He said he punched back in self-defense, opening a deep cut on the man’s cheek, and later grabbed two knives to protect himself but never used them.
A woman who was home at the time told deputies the two looked like “two animals punching each other” as she begged them to stop. The fight moved through the house, including a struggle over a PlayStation console that ended up broken on the floor. The man left in a white Toyota Camry, then stopped, got out and shoved the teen again before driving off. Deputies documented blood on the bedsheets, the floor and the bathroom sink, and a sheriff’s street team found the man at his own residence and took him into custody.
Vanderhost is being held in the Palm Beach County Jail on $26,000 bond.
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