A 13-year-old is at the Claxton Youth Detention Center and is being charged with aggravated assault following an incident late Monday afternoon.

Effingham County sheriff’s deputies are charging the teen after he allegedly attacked a 15-year-old with what is believed to be an axe handle in the Park West subdivision around 5 p.m Monday. The 15-year-old was taken to Memorial Health University Medical Center in Savannah with severe head injuries, according to Detective David Ehsanipoor.

The two teens apparently had been arguing before the incident.

“We don’t know what caused all this,” Ehsanipoor said. “The verbal altercation turned physical.”

There were witnesses to the incident and investigators are trying to determine how the 13-year-old got the axe handle and where it came from. They also are trying to determine the number of times the 15-year-old was struck by the axe handle.

In another case, Effingham sheriff’s investigators are charging Randall Wayne Turner, 34, with arson and reckless conduct in connection with a house fire early Saturday morning. Investigators believe Turner, wanted on unrelated charges in Screven County, set a home on High Bluff Road on fire.

Turner remains in the Joseph M. Still Burn Center at Doctors Hospital in Augusta, where he is being treated for injuries resulting from the fire.