POULSBO — A 53-year-old Poulsbo man arrested last week for shooting at the feet of his neighbors said he did so in self-defense.

The man told deputies the confrontation started when he noticed his neighbors on the 6100 block of NE Silver Springs Lane were having a party Saturday night.

“As a way to say, ‘Happy party or happy birthday!'” to his neighbor, the man “spun his tires” in the street, according to Kitsap County sheriff’s reports.

The neighbors, concerned the man was drunk, tried to remove the keys from his truck, prompting him to draw a 9mm pistol and shoot into the ground. A number of witnesses were standing around the man’s truck, one of them holding a baby.

In the 53-year-old’s version, the neighbor tried to “gouge his eyes out,” he told deputies, who determined the man had been drinking.

He was booked into the Kitsap County jail for investigation of drive-by-shooting.