It was a bizarre incident involving a pedestrian being pinned by a car and the driver being stabbed in the face.
It all happened in Vernon in 2016, and on Friday, a judge heard two wildly different accounts of what occurred with both the victim and the accused driver giving their version of events.
The alleged driver of this car, Abd’L-Malik Loubissi-Morris, is on trial accused of deliberately using the vehicle as a weapon, hitting and pinning a Vernon pedestrian he didn’t know.
On Friday, that pedestrian took the stand. Lisa David said she was hit by a vehicle while on the sidewalk.
“I tried to run but I only got one step before the car smoked me in the right knee and I landed on top of the hood,” said David on the stand.
The incident happened on 27 Avenue in Vernon. David told the court she went flying from the hood of the car, sliding across the ground and landing on the sidewalk.
“Then he continued to drive his car at me a second time and the driver’s-side tire was going over my right leg and my knee disappeared,” David said.
She said her right leg was under the driver’s-side tire.
“I kind of accepted that I might die in that second,” said David.
She told the court she watched her boyfriend, Thomas Ritchie, punch out the vehicle’s window and turn the wheel and felt the tire come off her leg.
Ritchie has also admitted to stabbing the driver in the face during the incident. He was sentenced to two years probation for assault with a weapon in connection with the incident.
Loubissi-Morris has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him including assault with a weapon.
On Friday, the 20-year-old took the stand in his own defence.
He told the court he was waved over by a man in a red bandanna who asked him to empty his pockets and sprayed him with an irritant which obstructed Loubissi-Morris’ vision.
Loubissi-Morris described being in an adrenaline rush state, rolling forward trying to drive away and coming to a stop.
“I was just being attacked and it was very traumatic. That is when I started getting stabbed… glass breaking and everything,” said Loubissi-Morris.
Ritchie has flatly denied causing the accident by spraying the driver with mace.
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