“Throughout the struggle he was threatening to kill officers, put a bullet in their heads, and said he would go down for murder.”
A man who tried disarming a Saskatoon police officer during an arrest has been sentenced to 240 days in jail followed by 12 months on probation.
Aaron Shayne Peequaquat-Svandrlik, 27, was sentenced this month in Saskatoon provincial court after entering guilty pleas in connection with an incident in the 1000 block of 20th Street West.
According to the facts read in court, police responded around 12:30 p.m. on June 21 after they were told Peequaquat-Svandrlik had threatened staff at The Bridge, a Christian ministry that serves Saskatoon’s core neighbourhoods.
Peequaquat-Svandrlik fought with police, threatening to grab an officer’s Taser and use it on her, said Crown prosecutor Lee Hnatiuk.
Instead, he grabbed for the officer’s carbine magazine.
“Throughout the struggle he was threatening to kill officers, put a bullet in their heads, and said he would go down for murder,” Hnatiuk said.
Court heard Peequaquat-Svandrlik was released from custody, then arrested again six days later for smashing the Mobile Crisis building’s windows with a golf club.
Hnatiuk said he resisted arrest and told officers he would return to damage the building as soon as he got out of jail. Court heard he’d also ripped an intercom off the building’s wall on June 20.
Under the joint sentencing submission proposed by the Crown and defence and accepted by the court, Peequaquat-Svandrlik got 30-month concurrent sentences on the mischief charges in addition to the 210-day jail term for attempting to disarm an officer.
Hnatiuk said Peequaquat-Svandrlik has a significant prior criminal record that spans from 2014 to 2023.
Defence lawyer Nathan Metivier said his client was in foster care from the ages of four to nine — when he was adopted — and moved into an emergency group home from the ages of 14 to 18.
He then lived at a mental health home until he was 21, court heard. Peequaquat-Svandrlik, who has ADHD and FASD, wasn’t taking his medication and had consumed alcohol which “reacted very poorly with his mental health condition,” Metivier said.
“It goes without saying that FASD can be a challenging disorder for people who have it, and is often associated with involvement in the criminal justice system,” he said.
Court heard Peequaquat-Svandrlik stopped working in roofing last year after falling off several roofs and is currently on income support for disability. Metivier said he also gets help from the Saskatoon Crisis Intervention Service’s Intensive Community Support program, which will continue helping him after his release.
His probation conditions prohibit consuming alcohol and require him to complete any programming deemed necessary by his probation officer, including anger management.
He is also banned from going to Mobile Crisis and The Bridge, and cannot possess any firearms for 10 years.
The Saskatoon Star Phoenix has created an Afternoon Headlines newsletter that can be delivered daily to your inbox so you are up to date with the most vital news of the day. Click here to subscribe.
With some online platforms blocking access to the journalism upon which you depend, our website is your destination for up-to-the-minute news, so make sure to bookmark thestarphoenix.com and sign up for our newsletters so we can keep you informed. Click here to subscribe.