Major Mackrerel was hospitalized in Brooklyn on Sunday 4th October 2009 after he was attacked by a jealous husband wielding a two-foot samurai sword!. Major Mackerel, whose real name is Garfield Dixon, was slashed across the head and hand during a fight outside his East Flatbush home Sunday morning, suffering a severe cut on his left palm during the scuffle. He was somehow all smiles when he walked out of Kings County Hospital seven hours after the 8 a.m. attack. "I don't feel bad," said Mackerel, still wearing his hospital gown. "These things happen, It's a Jamaican thing," said Mackerel, 41, before adding that he was happy his attacker was immediately arrested. "How can I feel bad for someone who tried to kill me?" Mackerel was returning to his East 91st St. home from a trip to the store when he was ambushed by his neighbor Oscar Joseph, investigators have said. Joseph, 37, was holding the wicked blade when he confronted Mackerel and claimed his neighbor had been flirting with his wife.

"He was saying [Mackerel] was harassing his wife," said Novia Watson, the reggae star's girlfriend. "[But] he doesn't mess with his wife. I don't know why he said that." After a heated argument, the men started "wrestling for the sword," Watson said. "It was a big surprise," said Mackerel. "I was trying not to get cut, not to get stabbed." Joseph wildly swung his blade at his downstairs neighbor, opening up a small cut on Mackerel's head and slicing his hand. "He was chopped with a sword," Watson said. "I couldn't believe it." Joseph was arrested minutes later in front of the building, still clutching the bloody sword. He was charged with assault with intent to cause a serious injury, menacing and criminal possession of a weapon. Mackerel, who denied harassing Joseph's wife but admitted that a few of his friends may have cat-called her earlier in the year, first tried to play down the seriousness of the assault. "I had a little argument with a guy and a fell," the lanky reggae star joked. "Just kidding. I had a fight and I got cut." Mackerel released several albums in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and gained fame in reggae circles for hits like "Dutty Bungle" and "Sorry Fi Botha." Joseph, whom neighbors said kept to himself, had several prior arrests for unlicensed driving but no previous violent crimes, according to records.