What is the law
 

What's the law for when somebody takes out a baseball bat to threaten you in traffic? If they hit your car and there's minor damage but the rest of the time they are using it to just scare you, what kind of charges can you press? If they push you repeatedly but you just wait for the police to come, is there something you can charge? In my situation, I decided not to turn left on a yellow after a 2nd car and this guy comes out to threaten me.

The cops said nothing will happen and will not take this to court...

you can't file charges? but the police could consider... assault, intimidation, uttering threats, mischief, vandalism

depends on the details, were you in the car when he attacked it? what was said? etc. but yeah, the above

find it odd that the police just told you to move along? did you call 911? or seek police out afterwards? witnesses?

that's a lot of road rage for not turning left on a yellow. suspiciously sounds like there's missing details here...

I called 911 on the spot and ignored his threats. I came out of the car when I saw him coming at me with the bat and he just started waving it until he saw me get on the phone.

Full details? LOL he honked at me multiple times and I gave him the finger.

if u have proof it would help... i believe.

take this with a grain of salt but... this is what i learnt.

if someone is standing across a river from you and waves a bat around and says imma kill you. it means nothing

but if they are standing within realistic striking range, it's considered some form of assault.

something like that. so if he was able to actually beat you and he uttered threatening words at you... and you have evidence... you probably have a case...

Did you record any of the assault? Were you able to get any witnesses? The above stated notion of you not being able to file a charge is simply incorrect.

That's weird that they told you you couldn't file charges. When my brother was verbally assaulted (guy told him he was going to bash his head in, punch him in the face, etc.) over a gas pump they asked if he wanted to file any charges. They weren't sure if they would be able to make them stick since nothing came of it (no weapons were brandished, just threats) but if he wanted to they were happy to file them. If it matters, we dealt with VPD.

If they wave around a bat infront of you intimidating you, that's assault.
If they damage your car with the bat, that's vandalism.
If they hit you with the bat, thats battery (no pun intended).

Assault would be the hardest to prove unless if you had video evidence or witnesses.

Get a 2-channel cam (front and back) with audio, don't flip off other drivers.

Some flip out even when you just throw your hands up in acute disgust. Happened to a friend and I once.

VPD can be lazy, I had a friend flip off a guy who was being a jerk on the road and honking, when they stopped the guy got out of his car and hit my friends car and him... cops showed up and said there wasn't anything they could do because they had no proof.

I think it comes down to how lazy the cop is sometimes but not always. Just assumptions, I ain't no expert. I was sitting in my car in an alley adjacent to Holt Renfrew, saw a guy run the the alley with a LV bag get in a getaway car and booked it. 5 seconds later saw security run out only to be too late. I gave them my contact, licence plate and description. Cops came to Holts the next day said despite all the evidence including video footage from in the store they can't do anything and left. I was like huh? Sure me seeing the guy run down the alley doesn't mean anything since I can't prove the bag he was holding was stolen but the footage from in the store wasn't enough? mm k

Close,

In Canada,
the first one would be Assault or Uttering Threats
second is Mischief
and third is Assault with a Weapon.


For OP, if the police will not proceed further, and you have your own evidence to back up any of the offenses and you really want to take it further you can charge the person yourself.
You will have to lay an information to a justice of the peace and they can issue a summons for the accused. BUT you also need the identity of the person that did it.

Is it worth it though?

http://www.cbabc.org/CBAMediaLibrary...h_Brochure.pdf

Its free and informative but in the end, you should always contact a lawyer. also TLTR but i hope this is still helpful! :)

Have more proof/evidence than he said she said. Otherwise the police/crown counsel will not even proceed as the judge will most likely toss it or handout a garbage sentence.

people are way too uptight in traffic.. the slightest thing can set them off

i never flip anyone off anymore. i throw up one of these:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...96f1a6dd4c.gif

and get one of two reactions: 1) confused and stunned 2) laugh.

either way i metaphorically jizzed on them...so my dominance is asserted and i win lololol

just say the guy threatened to sodomize you with the baseball bat and im sure the police will take it more seriously

tl;dr

http://i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...87/322/3a9.jpg

Wonder if the guy was in an Audi?

https://i.imgur.com/jMkK44f.jpg

(the above is actually from a car in WA state...used to know the owner through another forum)

-Dave

waiting for the day we see these...

I had video evidence of a guy getting out of his car and kicking my door and initially VPD said they wouldn't do anything. I ended up filing a complaint through the OPCC (The Provincial Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner) and it got escalated to a sergeant who did write some tickets and have a chat with the guy.

If you don't have video evidence it's easy to understand why you'd have a hard time, anyone can say so-and-so did this-and-that and even with witnesses they're notoriously unreliable.

maybe don't flip people off unless you can back up your threat (telling him to fuck off)

just sit in your car like a pussy and take his honking next time