A man who spat a “loogie” at a truck driven by an off-duty cop, then got out of his Lexus brandishing a knife in a moment of road rage, has been found guilty of assault with a weapon by a North Vancouver provincial court judge.
Jesse James Stanislaw Skierka, 24, was found guilty of the charge Sept. 8 by Judge Bryce Dyer following a trial in North Vancouver provincial court.
According to Dyer’s written decision, the road rage incident broke out Jan. 27, 2015 around dusk, as Sergeant Sean Powell, a 19-year veteran of the RCMP, was driving an unmarked pickup truck across the Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Crossing after a day of work at RCMP headquarters in Surrey.
Powell was driving north in the middle lane of traffic just after the Cassiar Tunnel when a green Lexus driven by Skierka tried to cut in on the right. When Powell didn’t let him into the lane, Skierka passed traffic by driving on the paved shoulder of the road and cutting in quickly to the left, Powell testified during the trial.
A few minutes later, the two vehicles found themselves side by side, stuck in bridge traffic gridlock. That’s when Skierka leaned across the passenger seat of his Lexus, stuck his head forward and spat on the fender of Powell’s truck.
When Powell moved his truck behind Skierka’s Lexus to get the licence plate, Skierka slammed on the brakes, Powell testified. Skierka then got out of his vehicle and pulled what Powell described as a knife from the driver’s side door cubby and moved toward him.
Concerned that Skierka wanted to stab him, Powell grabbed his police badge and yelled “police.”
Powell testified Skierka looked shocked, went back to his vehicle and drove away.
Powell called 9-1-1 and followed the Lexus. He testified Skierka continued to drive erratically, stopping abruptly in traffic and making crude gestures at him. North Vancouver RCMP arrested Skierka as he turned on to Lonsdale Avenue.
Testifying in his own defence at the trial, Skierka told the judge he spat on Powell’s truck because he felt Powell had “disrespected him” for not allowing his Lexus to merge into the lane. He agreed under questioning that it was “a childish gesture, a disgusting action on his part and not a nice thing to do,” according to the judge.
Dyer agreed, finding the decision to lob a spitball at Powell “a very aggressive act on his part and a highly inflammatory one.”
Skierka denied in court he grabbed a knife in the resulting confrontation, telling the judge he grabbed a glue stick instead, which was also in the cubby.
But the judge didn’t believe him, stating it wasn’t reasonable that Powell would confuse a knife with a glue stick. Dyer said it was clear Skierka was angry and used the knife to threaten Powell.
Dyer found Skierka not guilty of a second charge of dangerous driving, commenting there was no evidence he hit anyone or caused an accident.
“The court must distinguish between driving that is merely negligent and that which is sufficiently dangerous to attract a criminal sanction,” he wrote in his decision. A sentencing hearing for Skierka is scheduled for December.
