Road rage trial told of bat attack

Dramatic video played Thursday in a St. John's courtroom depicts a man placing a desperate call for police help after being hit by a bat-wielding driver.

Christopher Robert Hollett, 31, is being tried in provincial court in a road-rage case that involved a flipped finger, a high-speed chase and a violent confrontation at a gas station, where the clerk happened to have gone to school with the accused.

On Friday, court heard that Hughie Purcell, a clerk working at an Ultramar station onKenmount Road, had identified Hollett from a police photo lineup.

Purcellsaid that Hollett looked familiar, but he did not know why.

Until then, no one including beating victim Dennis Fleming had been able toidentify Hollett as the man who took a bat to Fleming in June 2010 and, repeatedly, to his van.

On cross-examination, Purcell said he was not100 per centsure that the man he saw that night was Hollett. He said he had told police that he was 95 per cent sure it was Hollett.

Hollett is being tried for dangerous operation of a motor vehicle, assault with a weapon and assault causing bodily harm, among other charges.

Fleming testified that the incident started on Columbus Drive when he became angryafter a driver cut him off, and he flipped a middle finger at the other driver.

Fleming said the driver then cut him off again and, minutes later,came to his window near the Nalcor headquarters on Columbus Drive.

Fleming testified that when lowered the window,Hollettpunched him. When Fleming tried to pull away, he said, Hollettsmashed his window with a bat.

A high-speed chase ensued in the areawith speeds hitting up to 185 km/h. Fleming said the other driver tried to push him off the road.

Fleming, whose girlfriend was in the car, drove to an Ultramar station on Kenmount Road where he asked a clerk to phone police. The incident was recorded on surveillance video.

For the first time, audio from such a recording has been played in court.

"He hit me with a bat and I have his licence plate," Fleming told police.

The confrontation, though, continued at the station. The other driver grabbed him and hit him several times with the bat.

Fleming got away, he said, but he watched as the driver smashed out his van's windows.