The group of five to 10 men disarmed the man, struck him with a street sign, knocked him to the ground and beat him while he was down, Spokane Police said.

SPOKANE, Wash.-- A fight among several people that escalated into a stabbing took most of the Spokane Police Department’s resources to handle early Saturday morning.

Around 1:20 a.m., Spokane Police officers responded to a report about a fight involving eight people outside of the bars in the 400 block of W. Sprague in downtown Spokane. Before officers could arrive on scene, the call updated to a stabbing and shooting, according to Spokane Police Sergeant Terry Preuninger.

Police said the shooting reports turned out to be inaccurate.

It took 17 officers to control the crowd, detain suspects, find and interview witnesses and victims, and preserve evidence, police said. Two additional, unrelated fights also broke out in the crowd during the investigation.

The incident started when a man and woman tried to break up a fight between two women they did not know out in the street, police said. The fight quickly escalated when five to 10 men attacked the first man, who attempted to intervene between the two women.

The group of men followed the first man into the street and surrounded him, police said. The man then pulled out a knife and stabbed one of his attackers.

The group of men disarmed him, struck him with a street sign, knocked him to the ground and beat him while he was down, police said.

He and the man he stabbed twice were taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, police said.

Police said man who was beaten by the group of men suffered a large head wound about two to four inches in diameter and had a five-inch spike from a hair pick stuck in his calf. One of the women involved drove herself to a hospital for facial injuries.

Many people who sustained injuries during the incident chose not to pursue charges or fled the scene prior to police arrival, police said.